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When you look at a photograph, is that the truth? If it’s a disgusting picture, such as those taken at Abu Ghraib, what judgments do you make in your mind about those in the picture? Do you think about what is going on just outside the frame of the picture? Do you think about the motivations of the person taking the photos, or the conflicting emotions of a woman giving a thumbs-up every time she is photographed? Can you fathom anyone looking at any of the pictures from Abu Ghraib and not think they are anything other than torture? These are the questions addressed in Errol Morris’s documentary.

Like Morris’s other documentaries, such as MR. DEATH and FOG OF WAR, he mixes talking-head interviews, where the subjects look nearly into the camera, and re-enactments, a technique he revolutionized in THE THIN BLUE LINE. In building this film, Morris seems captivated by statements by indicted soldiers Megan Ambuhl and Javal Davis. Ambuhl says that the photos only show that moment in time not what lead up to it or followed it. Davis says that the real torture, often committed by CIA agents, was never caught in photos or videotaped. All that was going on in the notorious photos was “softening up,” just standard operating procedure.

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Based on the National Endowment for the Arts anthology of essays, poems and letters from soldiers, Richard E. Robbins’s Oscar-nominated documentary collects writings from soldiers in Iraq using various filmic techniques from photomontages to animation to recreate them. Voiced by actors, the tales range from the humorous to the heartrending. The film puts a real human touch to the war, which has become either a war of political extremes or sanitized in the mainstream media (which that includes Fox News).

The Iraqi soldiers’ stories are interspersed with thoughts on combat from writers who served in wars from WWII to Vietnam. The stories touch on the absurdity of war. Set to reenactments, the beginning story from Army Sgt. Denis Prior discusses the contradictory feelings of awaiting the war to begin – knowing it’s a terrible idea, but afraid that it might not happen. Army Sgt. Brian Turner and SSGT Edward Gyokeres’s stories provide humorous takes on combat. Turner’s takes viewers through a tour of combat clips, enhanced by graphic notes hidden in the scenes, giving helpful hints for the inspiring soldier if they want to survive. Gyokeres’ is manual to address the terrible boredom and living conditions of the combat zone.

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