Morris Davis is former chief prosecutor for the military commissions at Guantanamo Bay and is now on the faculty of the Howard University School of Law. The Rev. Richard Killmer is executive director of the National Religious Campaign Against Torture.

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‘Zero Dark Thirty’ Tortures the Truth About Interrogations

by Morris Davis 01-14-2013
RNS photo courtesy Columbia Pictures

Jessica Chastain plays a member of the team of spies devoted to finding Osama Bin Laden. RNS photo courtesy Columbia Pictures

Nothing was tortured more in the making of Kathryn Bigelow’s film Zero Dark Thirty than the truth about torture.

While it’s just a movie, it runs the risk of becoming the basis for a false view of reality for millions of moviegoers who have largely ignored a decade of debate about the efficacy of the United States sanctioning torture.

To dismiss the movie as simple entertainment ignores the impact seeing it has on our perception of reality, even when we understand we are watching actors in a — mostly — pretend setting.

The fact that Zero Dark Thirty was nominated this week for an Academy Award for Best Picture only underscores the importance of understanding what it gets wrong about torture.