Torture: Hero Dark Dirty

The film, “Zero Dark Thirty”, had engendered high controversy over its depiction of torture as efficient and neutrally moral in the film. Mark Bowden in his article “Zero Dark Thirty” is not pro-torture, attempts to disclaim this depiction, of its importance through calling it a film and denying it’s assistance in acquiring information through the movie.

One of the biggest claims that Bowden makes against the film’s depiction of torture, is that it’s is only a film and shouldn’t be taken into account by the public as literal. However, in the beginning of the movie, the words “Based on true accounts” appear before the audience as calls of tragedy in 9/11 are played. These simple words create a perception that the events are true and perfectly depicted, as they happened, however this is clearly not the case. Bowden claims that this label of “true story” is a Hollywood label that has an extensive amount of false information offered the viewer. I strongly believe however, that a subject so delicate such as torture should not be accounted for in false pretense, such a subject should be given to the audience in its true form and with its doubts on morality. An example of this is during the waterboarding scene, in the actual events one of the torturers walked out as he felt this was too crude and illegal and desired to take no part in such action. ​In the movie, this amorality and wrongness of the action is never brought up, nothing contradicts torture or stops it, but only it’s “effectiveness” developed throughout the movie to support it. Since the beginning of the film is torture proven effective, in fact despite Bowden’s argument that “torture never offers critical pieces of evidence” the first scene proves otherwise. In the scene where the captive is being water boarded, the captive gives the first piece of information that will actually set in motion the events of the film, without this single piece of information then the rest of the film would not be set in motion, conveying the reliance and effectiveness on torture to achieve the goal of capturing Bin Laden. Bowden attempts to discredit it’s realism by claiming it’s a film and because it’s “true events” claim is under Hollywood script, it is clearly not accurate and will be disregarded as factual evidence. This however, not the case as in the movie series of “paranormal activity” or “Dark skies” which many people actually believe them to be realistic account of events. Even when they are seen by many as simply entertainment, it doesn’t fail to change the audiences’ perceptions of things, in the cases of those movies, the paranormal.

Works Cited

- Bowden, Mark. ""Zero Dark Thirty" Is Not Pro-Torture." The Atlantic (n.d.): n. pag. 3 Jan. 2013. Web. 2 Feb. 2016. <http://www.theatlantic.com/entertainment/archive/2013/01/zero-dark-thirty-is-not-pro-torture/266759/>.