The Thin Blue Line (1988)

I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.

Better Late Then Never

It is not deep, but it is fun to watch. It does have a bit more of an edge to it than other similar films.

This is one of the few movies I've ever seen where the whole audience broke into spontaneous, loud applause a third of the way in.

This week I watched The Thin Blue Line (1988). This was a riveting documentary that articulated just how swayed the "justice" system can be when it wants to believe a guilty narrative. It made me feel that Randall Adams was lucky that his case was stayed as he may have been falsely put to death otherwise. It also made me wonder how many innocent people have actually died at the hands of our death penalty as a result of false prosecution. This may even be the entire point of this story. However, it may have been the secondary point. I think the first point of the film was Randall's innocence. The film clearly made its point because Randall's case got a re-hearing and was released from prison the following year. As with many documentary films, this film was told from multiple perspectives, all of which supported the main narrative of Randall's innocence. The pacing of the film changed organically with the nature of the story. The film opened with a quick pacing and slowed down as each character said their piece. The payoff of the film really came for me after the film when I further researched what happened after the film was released. The editing really colored my emotional reaction as the editor chose parts of the film to lead the viewer's expectations one way or another. I think the film was really well done and really drove home some important points when it comes to our justice system.

In 1976, Dallas police officer Robert W Wood was killed during a traffic stop. His partner was one of the first female police officers in Dallas. The car was stolen and she had problems recalling the event. Randall Dale Adams was eventually convicted for the crime. David Ray Harris had bragged about the killing but later claimed that it was Randall who killed the cop. David had picked up Randall hitchhiking and spend the day together. While Randall claimed to be with his brother, David claimed that he was with Randall who shot the cop.This is a breakthrough Errol Morris documentary. The case itself is interesting and the fact that it actually helped overturn the case is impressive. There is a hypnotic beauty to the reenactments along with the Philip Glass music. The movie does take a little while to lay down the incident. I think a more straight forward recitation of the main facts of the case with narration at the beginning would be better. This is a ground breaking documentary.

This film is marked by time, especially where things are dramatised by actors and some "suggestive" effects, e.g. a malt flying through the air. Despite that, the much more interesting stuff is caught from the interview objects, especially the Houston police at the beginning. I mean, first and foremost, the antifeministic approach from the white, middle-aged police who really wanted to nail the female police who failed to shoot her colleague's killers as they left.Still, the prosecutor and the judge is the real enigma; how the original verdict went the way they went is incredible but, as anybody who is into the legal system and its prejudices will tell you, some times a judge and prosecution just want to condemn a person and won't stop at anything to do so.Other interviews are quite something as well, especially one with the couple who semi-witnessed (or did they?) the shooting.Well worth a check, this one, despite being marred by time.

This well-prepared and compelling documentary has one or two moments of brilliance that lift it above the average. The first is the reconstruction of the crime at the centre of the story. A nightmarish, abstracted scene that David Lynch might have created, this drama plays over and over again, never going beyond the perimeter of the camera's widest angle. It not only traps the event in a space but also in time. The second is the editorial care with which the director frames serial offender David Harris - only in the final shot of this man speaking do we see him reach up to scratch his face, revealing his handcuffs.The story itself is a blatant miscarriage of justice (postscripts record Adams' acquittal). The most compelling thing is to watch those involved speak about the event. The belligerent and defensive self-righteousness of bigoted Dallas officers and a self-important judge bloat the screen; the calm equanimity of defence lawyers, detective Sam Kittrell and even Adams himself are as powerful an advocate as the evidence itself. There is very little music but what there is is the stripped down, undulating underscoring of Philip Glass. It's occasionally difficult to make out exactly what's being said given the mix and the nature of the vernacular and accents but that's a minor point for a major document. 7/10