The Thin Blue Line (1988 film)

David Ray Harris

Harris had testified in the original trial that he was the passenger in the stolen car, that he allowed Adams to drive and that Adams committed the murder. He recanted this testimony at Adams' habeas corpus hearing, but never admitted guilt in a judicial setting and was never charged in the case. In 2004, Harris was executed by lethal injection for the unrelated 1985 murder of Mark Mays in Beaumont, Texas, which occurred during an attempted abduction of Mays' girlfriend.

Critical reception

The Thin Blue Line has a metascore of 79 on Metacritic and 100% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Gene Siskel named it the 7th best film of 1988. Chicago Tribune.

Awards

The Thin Blue Line won Best Documentary honors from the New York Film Critics Circle, the Kansas City Film Critics Circle, the National Board of Review, and the National Society of Film Critics. Morris himself won an International Documentary Association Award, an Edgar Award, and a MacArthur Fellowship Genius Grant (1989). The film was marketed as "nonfiction" rather than as a documentary which disqualified it from being considered in that category for an Academy Award.

Legacy

Variety credits the film in a 2008 retrospective of documentaries as “the most political work of cinema in the last 20 years.”

The film has had a considerable influence on later television and documentary film, often credited with pioneering the style of modern crime-scene reenactments.

In 2001, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

Current TV placed the film 2nd on their list of 50 Documentaries to See Before You Die in 2011.

Postmodern themes

Some scholars believe that by calling the certainty of events surrounding the murder case into question, Morris positions the film as a postmodern text. Referencing theorist Fredric Jameson's framework, film critic Linda Williams refers to documentaries that seek only to reveal the past as supporting the notion of an “intensified nostalgia for a past that is already lost.” Conversely, "The Thin Blue Line" suggests Adams' innocence by clouding a previously established history.

Stanford Law Review author Richard Sherwin believes The Thin Blue Line actually presents two plots. Through the construction and ordering of the non-linear story Morris presents, he reveals an easy-to-follow narrative implicating Harris instead of Adams, not unlike the story that implicated Adams in the first place, because it presents an easy-to-believe retelling of history. The other, is what Sherwin points to as an example of “postmodern skepticism." Sherwin notes sociologist Jean Baudrillard's interpretation of the postmodern media landscape "flattening" meaning, and the impossibility of “truth, authority, and history” existing, as fitting within this notion. He criticizes The Thin Blue Line for failing to resolve what he calls an “acausal” plot, referencing certain details about the case that were presented but remain unanswered, such as where Adams actually was the night of the crime. Instead, the end of the film abandons the “acausal” plot by returning to the easy-to-believe narrative, that which paints Harris as the perpetrator. Sherwin argues that for the film to succeed as an affirmative postmodern work, it must contextualize the past events within a present narrative. In short, reveal through the clouding of history a present challenge, that of resisting the lure of a narrative and fulfilling “their sworn duty to convict only in the absence of reasonable doubt."

In an interview at the Museum of Modern Art, however, Morris denies being a postmodern at all, joking that “one of the nice things about Cambridge, Massachusetts is that 'Baudrillard' isn't in the phone book”. In a video interview for the Columbia Journalism Review, Morris reiterates his view of an inherent value in truth, acknowledging that our view of history will always be flawed, but that truth should still be sought after.

Literature

• Renée R. Curry: Errol Morris' Construction of Innocence in "The Thin Blue Line". In: Rocky Mountain Review of Language and Literature, Vol. 49, No. 2 (1995), pp. 153-167.
• Linda Williams: Truth, History, and The Thin Blue Line. In: Barry Keith Grant/Jeannette Sloniowski (eds.): Documenting the documentary: close readings of documentary film and video. 1998. ISBN 978-0814326398

External links

• The Thin Blue Line at IMDb
• The Thin Blue Line from ErrolMorris.com
• David Harris Offender Information
• Officer Robert W. Wood at The Officer Down Memorial Page, Inc
• Review of The Thin Blue Line

David Ray Harris

Harris had testified in the original trial that he was the passenger in the stolen car, that he allowed Adams to drive and that Adams committed the murder. He recanted this testimony at Adams' habeas corpus hearing, but never admitted guilt in a judicial setting and was never charged in the case. In 2004, Harris was executed by lethal injection for the unrelated 1985 murder of Mark Mays in Beaumont, Texas, which occurred during an attempted abduction of Mays' girlfriend.

Critical reception

The Thin Blue Line has a metascore of 79 on Metacritic and 100% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Gene Siskel named it the 7th best film of 1988. Chicago Tribune.

Awards

The Thin Blue Line won Best Documentary honors from the New York Film Critics Circle, the Kansas City Film Critics Circle, the National Board of Review, and the National Society of Film Critics. Morris himself won an International Documentary Association Award, an Edgar Award, and a MacArthur Fellowship Genius Grant (1989). The film was marketed as "nonfiction" rather than as a documentary which disqualified it from being considered in that category for an Academy Award.

Legacy

Variety credits the film in a 2008 retrospective of documentaries as “the most political work of cinema in the last 20 years.”

The film has had a considerable influence on later television and documentary film, often credited with pioneering the style of modern crime-scene reenactments.

In 2001, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

Current TV placed the film 2nd on their list of 50 Documentaries to See Before You Die in 2011.

Postmodern themes

Some scholars believe that by calling the certainty of events surrounding the murder case into question, Morris positions the film as a postmodern text. Referencing theorist Fredric Jameson's framework, film critic Linda Williams refers to documentaries that seek only to reveal the past as supporting the notion of an “intensified nostalgia for a past that is already lost.” Conversely, "The Thin Blue Line" suggests Adams' innocence by clouding a previously established history.

Stanford Law Review author Richard Sherwin believes The Thin Blue Line actually presents two plots. Through the construction and ordering of the non-linear story Morris presents, he reveals an easy-to-follow narrative implicating Harris instead of Adams, not unlike the story that implicated Adams in the first place, because it presents an easy-to-believe retelling of history. The other, is what Sherwin points to as an example of “postmodern skepticism." Sherwin notes sociologist Jean Baudrillard's interpretation of the postmodern media landscape "flattening" meaning, and the impossibility of “truth, authority, and history” existing, as fitting within this notion. He criticizes The Thin Blue Line for failing to resolve what he calls an “acausal” plot, referencing certain details about the case that were presented but remain unanswered, such as where Adams actually was the night of the crime. Instead, the end of the film abandons the “acausal” plot by returning to the easy-to-believe narrative, that which paints Harris as the perpetrator. Sherwin argues that for the film to succeed as an affirmative postmodern work, it must contextualize the past events within a present narrative. In short, reveal through the clouding of history a present challenge, that of resisting the lure of a narrative and fulfilling “their sworn duty to convict only in the absence of reasonable doubt."

In an interview at the Museum of Modern Art, however, Morris denies being a postmodern at all, joking that “one of the nice things about Cambridge, Massachusetts is that 'Baudrillard' isn't in the phone book”. In a video interview for the Columbia Journalism Review, Morris reiterates his view of an inherent value in truth, acknowledging that our view of history will always be flawed, but that truth should still be sought after.

Literature

• Renée R. Curry: Errol Morris' Construction of Innocence in "The Thin Blue Line". In: Rocky Mountain Review of Language and Literature, Vol. 49, No. 2 (1995), pp. 153-167.
• Linda Williams: Truth, History, and The Thin Blue Line. In: Barry Keith Grant/Jeannette Sloniowski (eds.): Documenting the documentary: close readings of documentary film and video. 1998. ISBN 978-0814326398

External links

• The Thin Blue Line at IMDb
• The Thin Blue Line from ErrolMorris.com
• David Harris Offender Information
• Officer Robert W. Wood at The Officer Down Memorial Page, Inc
• Review of The Thin Blue Line

David Ray Harris

Harris had testified in the original trial that he was the passenger in the stolen car, that he allowed Adams to drive and that Adams committed the murder. He recanted this testimony at Adams' habeas corpus hearing, but never admitted guilt in a judicial setting and was never charged in the case. In 2004, Harris was executed by lethal injection for the unrelated 1985 murder of Mark Mays in Beaumont, Texas, which occurred during an attempted abduction of Mays' girlfriend.

Critical reception

The Thin Blue Line has a metascore of 79 on Metacritic and 100% fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Gene Siskel named it the 7th best film of 1988. Chicago Tribune.

Awards

The Thin Blue Line won Best Documentary honors from the New York Film Critics Circle, the Kansas City Film Critics Circle, the National Board of Review, and the National Society of Film Critics. Morris himself won an International Documentary Association Award, an Edgar Award, and a MacArthur Fellowship Genius Grant (1989). The film was marketed as "nonfiction" rather than as a documentary which disqualified it from being considered in that category for an Academy Award.

Legacy

Variety credits the film in a 2008 retrospective of documentaries as “the most political work of cinema in the last 20 years.”

The film has had a considerable influence on later television and documentary film, often credited with pioneering the style of modern crime-scene reenactments.

In 2001, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".

Current TV placed the film 2nd on their list of 50 Documentaries to See Before You Die in 2011.

Postmodern themes

Some scholars believe that by calling the certainty of events surrounding the murder case into question, Morris positions the film as a postmodern text. Referencing theorist Fredric Jameson's framework, film critic Linda Williams refers to documentaries that seek only to reveal the past as supporting the notion of an “intensified nostalgia for a past that is already lost.” Conversely, "The Thin Blue Line" suggests Adams' innocence by clouding a previously established history.

Stanford Law Review author Richard Sherwin believes The Thin Blue Line actually presents two plots. Through the construction and ordering of the non-linear story Morris presents, he reveals an easy-to-follow narrative implicating Harris instead of Adams, not unlike the story that implicated Adams in the first place, because it presents an easy-to-believe retelling of history. The other, is what Sherwin points to as an example of “postmodern skepticism." Sherwin notes sociologist Jean Baudrillard's interpretation of the postmodern media landscape "flattening" meaning, and the impossibility of “truth, authority, and history” existing, as fitting within this notion. He criticizes The Thin Blue Line for failing to resolve what he calls an “acausal” plot, referencing certain details about the case that were presented but remain unanswered, such as where Adams actually was the night of the crime. Instead, the end of the film abandons the “acausal” plot by returning to the easy-to-believe narrative, that which paints Harris as the perpetrator. Sherwin argues that for the film to succeed as an affirmative postmodern work, it must contextualize the past events within a present narrative. In short, reveal through the clouding of history a present challenge, that of resisting the lure of a narrative and fulfilling “their sworn duty to convict only in the absence of reasonable doubt."

In an interview at the Museum of Modern Art, however, Morris denies being a postmodern at all, joking that “one of the nice things about Cambridge, Massachusetts is that 'Baudrillard' isn't in the phone book”. In a video interview for the Columbia Journalism Review, Morris reiterates his view of an inherent value in truth, acknowledging that our view of history will always be flawed, but that truth should still be sought after.

Literature

• Renée R. Curry: Errol Morris' Construction of Innocence in "The Thin Blue Line". In: Rocky Mountain Review of Language and Literature, Vol. 49, No. 2 (1995), pp. 153-167.
• Linda Williams: Truth, History, and The Thin Blue Line. In: Barry Keith Grant/Jeannette Sloniowski (eds.): Documenting the documentary: close readings of documentary film and video. 1998. ISBN 978-0814326398

External links

• The Thin Blue Line at IMDb
• The Thin Blue Line from ErrolMorris.com
• David Harris Offender Information
• Officer Robert W. Wood at The Officer Down Memorial Page, Inc
• Review of The Thin Blue Line

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