A Movie and A Book

This weekend I watched a movie; "Fahrenheit 9-11" and read a book by Robert McNamara; "In Retrospect".

Both have a lot of relevance to what is happening in the world today. The movie while looking at the recent events, does not offer any solutions but rather wants to convey a kind of shock value using some dramatics. I felt the movie could have been made much better as this is a very important topic. However I think Michael Moore focuses too much on the dramatics rather than focus and research the topics at hand.

For example the scene where in he is standing outside the Senate Building asking Senators to sign up their kids for the war. Now this is pure drame; how can a Senator (or for that matter anyone) commit their adult kids. That is something the kids should decide for themselves. However this has a dramatic effect and nothing else.

Also when talking about families who have lost kids in Iraq, he again focuses on one family from Flint Michigan. He doesnot talk to any of the other families. When he talks to people who have lost dear ones in the 9-11 attack again he only talks to one person. No different perspectives are given or additional families are interviewed.

He doesnot cover the search for the WMD or the intelligence issues or how the Bush Administration has changed its message on Iraq over time. So in a way the movie defeats itself as it focuses too much on drama rather than the message. I would classify the movie as a documentary drama.

The book on the other hand is invaluable. It offers a history of how America got involved in Vietnam by one of the key members of the cabinet at the time; Robert McNamara. It shows how intelligent people, because of the circumstances, make decisions without analyzing data or questioning the underlying assumptions. This book should be necessary reading for everyone interested in the Iraq war. The chapter on the lessons from the Vietnam war is just compelling. It is amazing that if one were to ignore that the book is on the Vietnam war one would easily mistake it for the Iraq war. The lessons listed in the book, apparently have not been learned and assimiliated yet by the US Government for over 30years!

Amazon.com: Books: When the War Was over [Published in English]

Books: When the War Was over [Published in English]
Author: Elizabeth Becker
" Excellent. A must read on Cambodian History, August 9, 2004
Reviewer: A. Prabhu (San Jose, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(Review Posted on Amazon.com)
I really liked this book. The book covers a lot of ground. Apart from covering at Cambodian history, the book tells the tales of individual Cambodians who have lived or died through the Khmer Regime. The book also covers the world political influence as the tragedy unfolds in Cambodia and how each of these players plays an active or passive role in the tragedy. The reporting on the resolution of the conflict is also very interesting. It shows how geopolitics and individual personalities are so critical in resolution of these types of conflicts.

The book also covers US attitudes towards the IndoChina region in the aftermath of the Vietnam war and what the implications of the attitude were to the region.

The only drawback of the book I found is that sometimes the narrative gets a little tedious and repetitive."