The Thin Blue Line

Stunning depiction of a gross miscarriage of justice
This is an extraordinary documentary in which film maker Errol Morris shows how an innocent man was convicted of murdering a policeman while the real murderer was let off scot free by the incompetent criminal justice system of Dallas, Texas. The amazing thing is that Morris demonstrates this gross miscarriage of justice in an utterly convincing manner simply by interviewing the participants. True, he reenacts the crime scene and flashes headlines from the newspaper stories to guide us, but it is simply the spoken words of the real murderer, especially in the cold-blooded, explosive audio tape that ends the film, that demonstrate not only his guilt but his psychopathic personality. And it is the spoken words of the defense attorneys, the rather substantial Edith James and the withdrawing Dennis White, and the wrongfully convicted Randall Adams that demonstrate the corrupt and incompetent methods used by the Dallas Country justice system to bring about this false conviction...

Haunting, Facinating, and True!
You can probably think of a handful of movies that seemed to affect your consciousness. Like the way some people say Catcher in the Rye changed their lives. But whether they actually changed you in a real, permanent way remains to be seen.

The Thin Blue Line is a different matter. This movie fundamentally affected at least one person's life in an irreversible way. Without giving away the plot, Randall Dale Adams will certainly never be the same.

The movie deals with the killing of a Texas Trooper and whether or not Texas justice got it right. Morris reveals the facts of the case using strange and haunting reenactments to cover multiple stories and exploring what people said vs. what the physical evidence suggested. He does not push a viewpoint but carefully crafts it, allowing you to accept or reject the various positions. Soon, you are drawn into the central issue of guilt or innocence and the many areas of gray in between.

It's a documentary that...

One of the damnedest documentaries I have ever seen.
I am a movie buff from Widener University, who bought this documentary on VHS as an afterthought while buying two other critically acclaimed docs, Streetwise and Gates of Heaven (both given 4 stars by Roger Ebert, who's like a second father to me). Although some people might not like the fact that this VHS version was pan-and-scan, the visual impact of the filmed interviews as well as the soundtrack still shines through. Anyone who wonders why so many people oppose the death penalty should see this film. People who have served jury duty (or are considering it) will also benefit. The Thin Blue Line not only shows how justice can miscarry all too easily, it makes its viewers get to know the interviewees all too well. Errol Morris's reconstructions of the different versions of Officer Wood's murder show up the inconsistencies of the witnesses' testimony so strongly that the real murderer, David Harris (who was only sixteen when he shot Wood)confessed to the crime. Of course by then...

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