The Fog of War (2003)

Best movie of this year hands down!

Let's be realistic.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Blistering performances.

This is an Errol Morris documentary where he interviews former US Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara. This is part lesson, part history, but mostly a confessional. It has stock photos and archival footage to lay out the history. It has the compelling original score by Philip Glass.What makes this compelling is the ultimate insider who is making a confessional of his life's lessons. Errol Morris takes this gem and polish it up with his editing, his ethereal questioning, and Philip Glass' music. It is a haunting portrait of somebody who is now gone. This basically serves as his last testimony.

After spending an hour or so with an old man, a product of a important American university, a corporate player and a major decision maker in government policy, a man probably responsible for thousands of human deaths, one wonders why more of us have not been incinerated by bombs set loose by well-meaning madmen who are able to intellectualize and justify mass carnage with few second thoughts.This is an admirable slice of film-making, and while recognizing it's importance as a document, the ideas emanating from the human centerpiece didn't exactly thrill me; mass annihilation is not a particularly salubrious topic. This is a creepy, unsettling film about a man who learns quickly but whose messianic zeal is frightening. The film questions humanity's ability to learn from past mistakes and is seldom optimistic about it.

Documentary's for me are kind of difficult to ruin. Just as long as the subject matter is interesting.Having said that I own and love this film. Mainly because, without reading too much into McNamara before i saw this, I grew up thinking he was an jerk who bombed Vietnam into oblivion.But this film is really, very insightful, into the US policy in Vietnam under McNamara, his intentions in the war effort, etc. McNamara also gives out some sobering information, in regards to the Cold War Era. Such as, "we developed a 100 megaton bomb, and we detonated it the upper atmosphere!" His 11 lesson are good lessons that everyone can use I believe, such as, have "empathy" and "proportionality should be a guideline in war".This is a must see in my book, It may not deserve a 10 out of 10 stars, but as far as documentary's are concerned this belongs as one of the best in recent years. And anyone wanting to hear US motivations from the Secretary of Defence's mouth himself should enjoy this film and be very thankful for it. I found that I empathized with McNamara, as he laid out his intentions, admitted his mistakes, and described how things could have gone drastically worse than they did if "they" we're not there dealing with these issue/conflicts/wars. Overall it is a very insightful movie whether you like McNamara or not, meaning, this is not a partisan movie like say, Micheal Moore's films are. I only wish they had this for all of our leaders.

The Fog of War is a valuable record of history and the life of the brilliant and controversial Robert S. MacNamara. The documentary, brilliantly told, recounts the life of MacNamara from his middle-class beginnings to Harvard, his role as an aide to General LeMay in WW2 in the aerial bombings of Japan, his rise in Ford Motors during the 1950's culminating in him replacing Henry Ford for all of one week before resigning to join President Kennedy as Secretary of Defence. The bulk of the documentary deals with the next seven years of the cold war and MacNamara's recounting of the Cuban missile crisis and gradually sinking into the morass that was Vietnam. MacNamara eventually resigned or was asked to and headed a little organization called the World Bank for about a decade. He was well and truly the stuff leaders are made of. He is quite candid and does admit to errors made in assessing Vietnam without fully apologizing or calling it a mistake. He describes the horrifying aerial bombings of 67 Japanese cities and confesses that if they had lost the war, he and LeMay would have been tried as war criminals. MacNamara also elicits some sympathy and almost seems human when he breaks down while describing Kennedy's assassination and his responsibility in choosing an appropriate burial spot. MacNamara was close to the action in some of the defining events of the 20th century. A brilliant mind and eloquent speaker even in his mid-80's, he communicates very effectively and is interesting to watch as he recounts historic events.Errol Morris is the greatest documentary film-maker of our times or possibly ever and knows how to present the vast amount of material he worked with (apparently over 20 hours of interviews with MacNamara over a two year period). There is none of that Michael Moore style personal interference in the narrative. Its all told dispassionately, yet Morris's anti-war message does come through quite clearly. Morris has dug up a lot of historic footage, created some footage to help the narrative along and made a brilliant decision to use Phillip Glass's minimalist score.This documentary left me reeling for a few days and it really expands the mental horizons and gives a vivid perspective on various historic events. Its also very entertaining and fluid viewing. Cinema doesn't get much better (or informative) than this.