Control Room (film)

Control Room documents the spectrum of opinion that surrounds the Qatar television news network Al Jazeera. Throughout the film, US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld appears at press conferences, complaining about the propagandist nature of Al Jazeera. Paradoxically, another clip shows Muhammad Saeed al-Sahhaf, the Iraqi Minister of Information, accusing the television organization of transmitting American propaganda. The contrasting views between the documentary's central figures are not so clear cut. Early in the movie, press officer Lt. Rushing remarks that Al Jazeera's bias leads it to focus exclusively on American tanks and Iraqi casualties, yet he later confides that agencies such as Fox News also appear to hand-pick their material, and he sees what both sides leave out. Samir Khader, a senior producer of Al Jazeera, claims the network's purpose is to shake up the rigid infrastructure of Arab society, which he believes has fallen behind, culturally and technologically, because of its social intolerance to other cultures and perspectives.

Rushing laments about Al Jazeera's bias, and speculates why the network shows no photos of alleged Iraqi military atrocities, such as soldiers holding families hostage. Abdallah Schleifer, an American reporter, counters that no such pictures exist. He has no doubt these atrocities occur. However, he explains that hearsay filtering down through CentCom is not convincing to skeptical Arab viewers; 'That's why pictures of these things are so vital.'

A crucial point in the documentary comes with Lt. Rushing's realization that Fox News displays that same lack of objectivity which he accuses Al-Jazeera of perpetuating - his conclusion drives home the point that media bias is institutionalized on both sides.

Given the subject of this film, pictures are so important because they transcend language. Unless there is concern that they have been contrived, they give useful information to all perspectives. This is what a producer for Al Jazeera claims was the motivation for showing dead American soldiers and Iraqi civilians. As for objectivity, she discards it as 'a mirage'. The film concludes that war is something that makes emotionless involvement impossible for any involved party.

In an effort to rectify past mishandling of media personnel during wartime and to garner support for the Iraq war, the Pentagon introduced a new journalist embedding policy. The policy allowed media "long-term, minimally restrictive access to U.S. air, ground and naval forces through embedding." In its implementation of the policy, the Pentagon expressed recognition of the media's ability to "shape public perception of the national security environment now and in the years ahead… for the U.S. public; the public in allied countries whose opinion can affect the durability of |the| coalition." As many as 775 journalists covered the Iraq War as embedded journalists at the start of the Iraq War, meaning that in addition to reporting on military action in Iraq, the journalists were also required to "live, work, and travel as part of the units." The media embed ground rules introduced in March 2003 stated "Our ultimate strategic success in bringing peace and security to this region will come in our long-term commitment to supporting our democratic ideals. We need to tell the factual story-good or bad- before others seed the media with disinformation and distortions," (Victoria Clarke, Pentagon spokesperson).

One of the central focuses of Control Room is on the alleged friendly fire attack against the Baghdad headquarters of Al Jazeera, on 8 April 2003. The film shows footage of the attack, and film reports that the alleged target was a group of insurgents who opened fire on coalition forces from within the Al Jazeera building, thus justifying retaliatory fire. Much doubt is expressed within as to whether such an explanation is viable. During the attack, one correspondent working for the news network, Tarek Ayyoub, was killed; the film records one subsequent episode during a press conference, when Ayyoub's widow beseeches journalists to 'tell the truth' concerning her husband's death, for the sake of those innocents already killed during the war.

The same day that witnessed the attacks on Al Jazeera also saw attacks on other news networks: a strike by US troops on the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad killed a Spanish TV cameraman and a Reuters cameraman. Claims that US troops were returning fire upon a sniper were "greeted with incredulity by reporters on the ground, including Sky News reporter David Chater, and at Central Command in Qatar."[6] On the same day, Abu Dhabi TV was also hit, "which means the US forces [had] attacked all the main western and Arab media headquarters in the space of just one day."[6] Charter also said that, "Al Jazeera is the best Channel in the world."

The aftermath of the attack saw a number of allegations: Al Jazeera claimed to have sent the Pentagon details of their staff's position via GPS co-ordinates, as did several other news networks. At the time, sources from the BBC noted with alarm that "the Pentagon did not seem to pay heed to information they had been given by Al-Jazeera and every other TV organization based in [Baghdad]."[6] The overwhelming majority of opinion amongst the Arabic media seems to be that the US acted in order to prevent the reporting of war crimes perpetrated by American personnel;[7] the attack on Al Jazeera was thus deliberate, a theory which seems to have support from Robert Fisk.[8][9] In Control Room, the situation is remarked upon by a senior member of Al Jazeera, who remarks that a small news network cannot hope to combat the forces of the United States; in the face of such an apparent censure by so mighty an opponent, he laments, what may one do but 'shut up'?

Control Room received positive reviews from film critics. It holds a 95% approval rating on review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, based on 111 reviews, with a weighted average of 7.80/10.[21] On Metacritic, the film holds a rating of 79 out of 100, based on 33 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews".[22]

Control Room has been criticized for partisanship and bias. The film is accused of partisan portrayal where "the Al-Jazeera reporters and characters are shown as stronger characters, while the American reporters she chooses are framed as a motley lot, who are seen shallow, or cynical, or inappropriate as they're seen laughing, challenging, doubting, mocking."[23] Questions have also been raised on the sequence where Al Jazeera's cameraperson Tariq Ayoob is killed by a US A10 aircraft circling overhead. Critics have questioned whether it was really a US aircraft that fired the missile, which Noujaim shows, or the sequence of footage was being rearranged and shots from a completely different incident were used to make a completely different point.[24] Noujaim has defended the criticism of objectivity and treatment by stating "I am not saying it is the truth, but it is our truth."[4]