Is torture permissible when national security is at stake? This was the question facing the US in the months and years following the 9/11 attacks. The Report takes us into this moral quandary as we learn the extent to which the country’s main intelligence agency implemented and attempted to cover up a controversial detention and interrogation programme.

Director: Scott Z. Burns

Screenwriter: Scott Z. Burns

Script source: Deadline

Based on: The US Senate Intelligence Committee study of the CIA’s Detention and Interrogation Program and, in part, on the Vanity Fair article, ‘Rorschach and Awe’ by Katherine Eban

Synopsis:

*Spoilers* Daniel Jones (Adam Driver), a committed Senate staff member, is tasked with investigating and compiling a report for Senator Dianne Feinstein’s (Annette Bening) Intelligence Committee on a programme of detention and interrogation introduced by the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon on 9 September 2001 (9/11). Jones works tirelessly for seven years to uncover the truth about the programme, which involved the use of torture against those suspected of having information on terrorist organisation, al-Qaeda. Jones’ report revealed that the programme not only failed in its objectives but that it flouted the law and involved a CIA cover-up of evidence in the process. Along the way, Jones faces pushback from the CIA, while there are fears that his report may never see the light of day.

Analysis:

*Spoilers* When a film begins with the caption ‘based on the Senate Intelligence Committee study of the CIA’s Detention and Interrogation Program’, you might think you’re in store for a dry docudrama-style procedural. In some ways, this assumption is true, as the story centres on Jones’ efforts to painstakingly research the programme and produce a damning report that would extend to over 6,000 pages. It also details Senator Feinstein’s work to use her political weight to see the report’s findings were made public.

What makes The Report ( actually The Torture Report) such compelling viewing is the way in which the story is structured, as we move between Jones’ investigative work and the harrowing implementation of the programme in question. Interrogation was, in this case, a relatively benign word used to describe a newly-developed method of torture. The programme was implemented in the months following 9/11, a time when the desire to ‘get’ those responsible and to prevent further domestic attacks meant, in some quarters at least, all bets were off. The idea behind the programme was to illicit information, with ‘suspects’ abused until they gave up titbits about the hierarchy of al-Qaeda and the terrorist acts the group was planning. The essence of what Jones uncovered was not that the programme existed and was authorised at high levels in the CIA, but that, frankly, it didn’t work. Not surprisingly, many of those being tortured did talk, but they only gave information that the US already knew, or they simply made stuff up to get the waterboarding (mock drowning), stress positions, beatings and sleep deprivation, etc, to stop.

While the story may be procedural in nature, there is no doubt as to which side we are meant to take, as we regularly flash back to realistically inhumane torture scenarios and scenes portraying the cavalier attitude taken by some of those running the programme. This is encapsulated by the icy cool CIA official Bernadette (Maura Tierney) and the two Air Force psychologists (played by T. Ryder Smith and Douglas Hodge) who come up with the supposedly effective, yet untried and untested, ‘enhanced interrogation techniques’, to the horror of FBI agent Ali Soufan (Fajer Al-Kaisi), who prefers a gentler, culturally aware approach to getting suspects to talk. The CIA’s willingness to introduce a programme that involved putting prisoners in insect-filled coffins, keeping them naked at all times, and shaving off devout Muslim men’s beards highlights just how much the agency was angered and embarrassed by the 9/11 attacks. As White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough (Jon Hamm) says at one point, ‘democracy is messy’.

Where the film really succeeds is leading us along with Jones and his investigation, as we find out the extent of the programme and share his outrage as he uncovers more details. The film may take sides, but the question still hangs over the film – should torture be permitted if it saves lives? It also weaves in much tension as Jones’ investigation continues and efforts to discredit him escalate, prompting him to take some risks. There’s even a dark car park meeting with a ‘Deep Throat’ figure (played by Tim Blake Nelson), who personifies the growing unease with which those participating in running the programme underwent their work.

At the centre of the story is Jones, played earnestly by Driver, who clearly understands the gravity of his task, committing years of his life to sitting in a stark basement room lit only with fluorescent light, working away with a scant staff to try and fit the pieces together with little help from the CIA. Even when the report is finished, it is subject to severe redaction that leaves it all but unreadable, highlighting how far those in charge went to keep Jones’ findings secret. As Feinstein, Bening is strong and determined, though this is tempered by political realities. Losing her role as head of the committee following the Senate passing into Republican hands gives her the chance to finally act on Jones’ findings before she hands over the reins.

Overall, The Report fits into the pantheon of procedurals, such as All the President’s Men (1976) and Spotlight (2015), in which committed investigators come up against the establishment as they try to expose wrongdoing at the higher echelons, putting themselves in harm’s way in the process. As such, this is a timeless story that stands next to those that covered the Watergate era and McCarthyism in the 1950s, showing the abuse of power and the idea that – to varying degrees – the ends justify the means. Like those that came before, The Report is, at its core, about the truth and efforts to keep that truth under wraps. It is also about accountability from those we entrust with our safety and security.

So, did Jones and Feinstein’s efforts lead to that accountability? What do you think?

Writer’s notes:

A few of the more interesting aspects of The Report include:

– The use of real footage: including that of the late Senator John McCain

– Yet another example of a streaming service (in this case Amazon Studios) bringing us a big-name feature film production that’s available to watch online around the same time the big screen release (a growing trend)

– Reference to the film Zero Dark Thirty (2012): which tells of the capture of Usama Bin Laden

– A structure that begins towards the end, with Jones talking with a lawyer, flashes back to show us how Jones got involved with the project and further flashes back to the introduction of the programme: this skipping around is deftly handled and is the main reason why The Report is far more than just men in suits hunched over computers and hurrying along corridors

– The unification of the big idea and the ‘little guy against the system’ journey: as writer/director Burns told Deadline’s The Contenders New York:

“The story that’s revealed in the report is incredibly horrifying and bizarre…Beyond that the story of Daniel Jones is incredibly compelling to me. This one guy sits in a windowless room for seven years and pieces together the puzzle.”