tears through the façade

Morris explores the reality of Abu Ghraib with a visceral intensity that straightforward reportage could never allow.

By returning to the pictures over and over again, Morris shows the power of the photos, how the visual record became the only evidence that carried any power in the media...

Morris widens our understanding of the real crimes that took place there. This is where the movie becomes not just a slant on history but also a vehicle for broadening our understanding.

Reduces one of the truly horrifying controversies in American military history to an intellectual puzzle.

Director Errol Morris tackled the Iraqi prison subject -- among the mass of recent Iraq war documentaries -- because he 'wasn't sure anyone else would tell it if I didn't tell it'.

After Errol Morris' "Fog of War", I was expecting something more provocative from him --- instead, what we get is a very lengthy, often repetitive viewing of the infamous photographs of Abu Ghraib.

The best I can say about this film is that it's important from the standpoint of having an historical record so an event like Abu Ghraib is not repeated.

Morris addresses the far more difficult question of why . . . the tragic flaw within the human psyche that could allow this travesty to occur, spelling out in stark terms why such behavior is, as the title says, is standard operating procedure

Sometimes painful to watch, but a movie that must be seen.