The Thin Blue Line is a “non-fiction” film that tells the story of the murder of a Dallas police officer and the man who was accused of the crime. The film is referred to as a non-fiction film as opposed to a documentary; this could be because the film has a distinct narrative tone to it, despite the fact that it also includes interviews. Parts of the film are reenactments of the night of the murder, shown differently based on the perceptions of the different people involved. It definitely has the feel of a crime drama. Reenactments have always been a question with documentaries, because the images shown on screen are not really what happened, and the point of a documentary is that it tells a true story. Reenactments move into the category of “based on a true story.” Morris says in the interview in “Recovering Reality” that his reenactments are not to be taken literally; their purpose is to put “that night” in the audience’s mind.
I think the title The Thin Blue Line was chosen for the irony. The quote is that police are “the thin blue line” between anarchy and civilized society, but the fact here is that the police are the ones creating the discourse by imprisoning the wrong man. One of the main problems that I have with this film is that it portrays the police officers as the “bad guys.” We as an audience go into the film as essentially unbiased observers, and we emerge furious and outraged at the plight of this innocent man. But the fact is that we also have to take a step back and look at it from the perspective of the law enforcement officers. One of their own was killed, and they were looking for answers. I am in no way condoning what they did, or saying that it’s okay that an innocent man was locked up for a crime he didn’t commit, but I can understand their thought process. This is the idea of self-deception; the police wanted justice, here was a man they could punish, problem solved. They convinced themselves that Randall Adams was the one who killed their colleague, and nothing anyone said or did could change their minds (until this film, obviously). The point that I am trying to make is that the police are human too; they weren’t deliberately out to get Adams, they just made a mistake and were reluctant to admit it.
In the article “Recovering Reality,” Morris comments that journalism is not supposed to be objective and unbiased; “a journalist’s job…is to try and ferret out what really happened; to ferret out the truth.” He says “journalism is an attempt to recover reality.” I found this quote interesting because in the (admittedly few) classes I’ve taken that have talked about journalism, one point that is always heavily stressed is that the goal of a journalist or a reporter is to present the story as objectively as possible. I am obviously not a journalism expert, so I don’t know much about the “rules,” but I also thought it was interesting in context with the previous article “The Myth of Objectivity in Journalism: A Commentary,” which says that no journalist or reporter can deliver a story with complete objectivity; there will always be a word choice or a facial expression or a tone of voice that will tip the scale one way or another.
Morris definitely utilizes the cinema-verite style of interviews, which according to “Poetics of the Documentary Film Interview” is used to “reveal or expose.” Morris enforces this idea in the article “Reality Check,” when he describes his three-minute rule: “If you leave people alone for three minutes and don’t interrupt them, they’ll show you how crazy they really are.” He believes that if you sit quietly and look like you’re listening instead of actually listening, people will spill their guts to you. This comes out at the end of The Thin Blue Line, during the audio interview, when David Harris, in a roundabout way, admits to killing the Dallas police officer.
New Terminology:
Habeas corpus: a writ requiring a person under arrest to be brought before a judge or into court, especially to secure the person’s release unless lawful grounds are shown for their detention
Duplicity: deceitfulness; double-dealing
Epistemological: the theory of knowledge, especially with regard to its methods, validity, and scope; the investigation of what distinguishes justified belief from opinion
Agitprop: political (originally communist) propaganda, especially in art or literature
Grandiloquent: pompous or extravagant in language, style, or manner, especially in a way that is intended to impress
Extemporaneous: spoken or done without preparation
Elegiac: (especially of a work of art) having a mournful quality; (of a poetic meter) used for elegies
Palimpsest: something reused or altered but still bearing visible traces of its earlier form
Polyvalence: having many different functions, forms, or facets
Veridical: truthful, veracious; not illusory; genuine
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