英语访谈节目:《刺杀本拉登》引发对酷刑的批评

JANE MAYER: Well, it's a combination.

Of course, you know, first of all, I should say I think the movie—filmmakers have a right to make any movie they want. I'm all for artistic freedom. But in the same vein, as someone who really followed this history, I feel like I have the right to comment on what they have done.

And what they have done is, they have compressed a lot of very complicated facts into what's basically a slick kind of TV show sort of police procedural, where it's very gripping, and it's fun to watch, but there's no moral context. And, basically, the question of whether torture works, that's complicated. Sometimes, it did. Sometimes, it didn't.

Frequently, what happened was people lied. And what the CIA said in two very important cases is that they found bin Laden's courier because the lies tipped them off that there was something more going on. That's a very shaky kind of basis on which to claim that torture worked, to say, because they lied, it was a success.

JEFFREY BROWN: Mark Bowden, come in on that. Respond. What do you see in this film?

MARK BOWDEN: Well, I think—I have written a book on the subject, so I can say with as much certainty as almost anyone at this point that torture didn't present the key information that led to bin Laden.

There was never a moment where someone under pressure coughed up a critical piece of information. The true story is a lot more complicated than that. And I think it's actually reflected fairly well in the presentation in the film, in that the early very repulsive and, as I said, ultimately futile torture sequences are followed by one where they try different tactics with the detainee.

And he tells them a piece of information that is not directly relevant to what they're looking for, and then I don't think they—and it showed this way in the film -- neither they or the detainee recognize will become tremendously significant down the road. But that, nevertheless, is how that name of the courier first surfaces.

So in my way of looking at it, that's—it's not exactly what happened. Clearly, the detainee portrayed is an amalgam. The dialogue is made up. But it reflects what—I think fairly accurately—what those early stages of the hunt...

(CROSSTALK)

JANE MAYER: I actually would disagree, in that—in one way, which is, this movie opens with someone being water-boarded.

Nobody who was water-boarded ever gave information that led to finding bin Laden. And this detainee is held by the CIA in the beginning of the movie. Basically, the first shreds of information that came out about the courier came from people down in Guantanamo, which were held by the military, not the CIA.

So this glorifies the CIA's worst torture methods, turns it into kind of a straight line that's like a necessary evil that gets you from water-boarding to finding bin Laden. I would be surprised if many people in the country don't conclude torture is a necessary evil and that the ends justify the means.

JEFFREY BROWN: That's where I wanted to go.

And I will come back to you, Mark, on this, because you sort of raised the "it's a movie" factor. Right? It's a drama. It's a dramatization. And I was thinking in my head today—we saw the nominations for another historical drama, "Lincoln."

I, like many people, saw it and liked it. And then we might realize that not everything is factual there. You're suggesting that that's OK in a sense, even though this is about more recent history, that we should see it as a kind of drama?

MARK BOWDEN: Yes, and I think that's how you should see it.

I think that I have been critical somewhat of the hype around the film, that it's journalistic. It isn't. It's, you know, as truthful as any Hollywood movie—more than most—that purports to be based on a true story.

I do think that when we get into the particulars of who first mentioned the name of Ahmed, the Kuwaiti, and under what circumstances, I don't think any of us knows precisely what happened. But I do think it's fair for the filmmakers to show that in those early years the mistreatment of detainees during interrogation was fairly commonplace. And I think it's portrayed as very ugly and in a very, I think, compromising way. So...

JANE MAYER: Can I say one thing more?

(CROSSTALK)

JANE MAYER: And I'm a big fan of Mark's, but I just think that what it doesn't show is, even in those earliest scenes, when the first detainee was water-boarded, there was—some of the people in that room threw a fit.

You do not see that in this movie. There was an FBI agent who walked out and said, I won't have anything to do with this, it's illegal, it's wrong, it's what our enemies do.

There's not a character in this movie who raises the question about whether torture is right or wrong, let alone whether it works.

JEFFREY BROWN: All right, let me ask you just very briefly, though, in our last 30 seconds. Your fear here is that this portrayal will impact public understanding and possibly policy?

JANE MAYER: I think pop culture is incredibly powerful.

I think the TV show "24," if you look at the numbers, changed public opinion and made people much more comfortable with torture.

JEFFREY BROWN: And, Mark, a last word from you on the same thing. You think this will affect public policy and public perception?

MARK BOWDEN: I think it will affect the way people remember this story.

I personally didn't take away, as Jane has, a strong message on the subject of torture one way or the other. I did, for instance, from the show "24," which is clearly pro-torture—not from this, though.

JEFFREY BROWN: Mark Bowden and Jane Mayer, thank you both very much.

JANE MAYER: Thanks for having me.

MARK BOWDEN: Thank you.