Taxi to the Dark Side
When filmmaker Alex Gibney’s Taxi to the Dark Side won the Best Documentary Feature Oscar, he said the following: “This is dedicated to two people who are no longer with us, Dilawar, the young Afghan taxi driver, and my father, a navy interrogator who urged me to make this film because of his fury about what was being done to the rule of law. Let’s hope we can turn this country around, move away from the dark side and back to the light.”
Indeed, it seems that the United States is comfortable operating on the “dark side.” The obvious use of torture in the fictional “War on Terror” has continually eroded the claims of moral superiority on the global stage. The symbol of Guantanamo Bay – now thankfully closing down c/o President Barack Obama – has served to recruit and impassion more terrorists than ever thought possible. And the continued abuses of power by the Bush Administration undermined every international law and statute pertaining to ethics in combat and war.
We all know by now that the Bush Administration may stand in history as one of the most horrific governments in American history. The damage to America’s reputation on the world stage seems, at times, irreparable. Yet, as Gibney stated in his Oscar acceptance speech, there is a sense of hope that the country can turn around and move towards the light. Perhaps Barack Obama is the answer to that.
Gibney’s documentary uses the tragic death of an Afghan cab driver named Dilawar to provide entry to what stands as a damning indictment of the Bush Administration’s policies towards torture and conduct during the concocted fight against terrorists. With an open license to join the “dark side” and use techniques against detainees that Darth Vader would find cringeworthy, the United States established themselves as the world’s foremost experts on the process of torture.
Taxi to the Dark Side examines the process as it trickles down from top military brass and White House occupants to reach the grunts on the bottom who are “just following orders.” Gibney interviews soldiers, many of whom have participated in torture, and casts light on the entire stinking process. He ruthlessly unearths data, news footage, and other footage to compile a damning case against the Bush Administration on the topic of torture. But, as we see, Bush and his cronies have left the backdoor open for themselves and knew which laws to manipulate and which buttons to push.
We also hear from administration officials and others who have resigned because of torture and the processes outlined by Donald Rumsfeld’s bloodthirsty policies. Rumsfeld, always the soulless joker when dealing with the media, is especially snappy and senseless as he tries to worm his way out of questions in front of the White House press corps.
Taxi to the Dark Side makes the case that torture does not work and that it does not provide accurate or even remotely useful information. We know this already if we have common sense on our side. Gibney works to debunk farcical notions supported by fictional television programs like 24 and right-wing blowhards like Bill O’Reilly that there is a professed “ticking time bomb” scenario that is actually realistic. Instead, the filmmaker argues that such a scenario is about as dubious as Sean Hannity having a sensible idea.
Taxi to the Dark Side is a must-see documentary. There are many who will argue the other side of this discussion, although I’m curious to know what those people tell themselves in order to sleep at night. The fact remains that the Bush Administration proceeded entirely and deliberately in the shadows in a sorry attempt to conduct a careless war on bare principles, leaving a population in the dark and a pile of top brass in the clear.
Trailer:
