Standard Operating Procedure

Review by Anthony Morris

Documentary maker Errol Morris (The Thin Blue Line) is usually a name you can trust when it comes to shining a harsh light onto a murky subject.

But Standard Operating Procedure, his look at the stories behind the torture photos taken inside Iraq's Abu Grabib prison in 2004, presents a surprisingly blurry picture.

There's no doubting his rigour in approaching the subject: he provides extensive interviews with almost everyone involved, and there's plenty of atmospheric re-enactments alongside dozens of the often distressing photos, maybe of which haven't been seen in public before. 

Gradually Morris builds a picture of a prison under constant attack from outside where the guards had little idea of where to draw the line and their superiors were happy to keep it that way so long as the truth didn't leak out. 

It's powerful material and Morris tells a gripping story with it, but he's severely undermined by the soldiers involved in the torture. 

They're almost universally unlikable, a collection of almost unthinking recruits barely able to understand that bashing prisoners is wrong under any circumstances. They seem to think even now that treating the prisoners like animals was okay simply because they weren't ordered not to do it, and while Morris does have a point when he argues that these troops were let down by the commanding officers who let this situation occur, it's hard to feel too sorry for people who have to be ordered to treat other people like human beings. 

This documentary clearly wants to have something larger to say about how the war was run, but the stunted morals of so many of its subjects means that it never really becomes anything more than just a record of some very bad business.

3.5 out of 5

Standard Operating Procedure
Australian release: 3rd July, 2008
Cast: Christopher Bradley, Sarah Denning, Joshua Feinman
Director: Errol Morris