Fog of War

I am a huge fan of documentaries. I remember back when I was first getting into them. I came across this great film, and wanted to share it with everyone. It’s a documentary on Mr. Robert McNamara and his life. It’s called The Fog of War: Eleven Life Lessons from the Life of Robert McNamara.

For those of you who don’t know who Robert McNamara was, he was a former president of the Ford Motor Company, entered politics and became the US Secretary of Defense during Vietnam, and later became the president of the World Bank.

I think what initially drew me to this film was that it focused on an era that I didn’t know much about. I’ve studied World War 2 quite a bit as a hobby, but really didn’t follow up my research of the time after that leading up to the 80s. At first glance (and read, I might add, regarding this review) it appears that this film is about the wars that occurred during his lifetime, and how his work influenced that. But really, this is more of a documentary on the man, and his struggles in such a difficult position, and how his actions in tern influenced the world.

What makes it even better is that the eleven life lessons that he learned throughout his life are presented in such a strong way. It’s interesting to see how a man that dealt with such a powerful war on his hands was able to relate these to things you and I experience on a daily basis. It’s informative, but not dull. I’ve had problems in the past with documentaries that move too slow on subjects I really want to understand. At no point did I feel that this documentary was dragging, or presenting unrelated information (which happens quite often in several highly acclaimed documentaries -cough- Born into Brothels -Cough-

Philip Glass scored the film, which was a perfect choice. If you’re unfamiliar with his work, Glass is a major proponent in the field of minimalist scoring. His repetitive soundtrack that builds during the entire film helps create an air of confusion, almost a quagmire of information and visual depictions of the chaos that was happening at the time.

Perhaps it’s because I’m a history buff that this film was so interesting for me. I can’t say the same for people that don’t care for documentaries, but this is one of the best I’ve seen, and I just wanted to share it with those that hadn’t heard of it, or for those that might be interested in the era. The technical aspects of the film are very solid. The film was directed by Errol Morris, who doesn’t have an enormous film resume. But that doesn’t display during the 95 minutes of this powerful story of Robert McNamara.