Saw the movie Deadline with my friend Karen — it covered the controversial topic, ‘The Death Penalty’, by relating the story of Illinois Governor George Ryan, who considered clemency for ~167 death row inmates. His consideration was prompted by discoveries of ~12 lifers who were later found to be not guilty — in the same timespan, ~13 people were executed. That means that right/wrong executions were basically a 50/50 coin flip, which you can consider somewhat troubling, if you are a thinking person.

I won’t tell you how the movie unfolds — but I can say that I highly recommend it for everyone — especially for people who haven’t spent much time thinking deeply about the death penalty. I was surprised, myself, even during the span of the movie, changing my opinion as to my position. That said, I left with a fairly firm point of view — one that I think/hope I carry with me for the rest of my life — this movie helped me get there.

The movie did a great job of presenting both sides/shades of the debate — I liked that — I’m not much of a fan of documentaries that only present one side of the coin.

In the end, I don’t think it comes down to innocent vs. guilty; rather, it is a much more basic question — “Do you think it is right to kill anyone?” If your answer to that is no, then there is no reason to ever consider anything beyond life in prison without parole. If your answer to that is yes, then you need to be sure the person you are killing is truly, 100%, guilty — that’s an extremely hard thing to do.

Karen and I saw a screening for Gunner Palace this evening — it was a documentary of sorts by Michael Tucker that portrayed his experience living with the Gunner brigage in ~2003 in Baghdad, Irag — they were based out of one of Saddam’s son’s (Uday) palace, hence the name. It was fairly powerful, as the film didn’t really take a political position or voice; rather, it let the soldiers themselves describe what they were going through, interpret the experiences, and communicate their emotions.

Afterward, the filmmaker and one of the soldiers spoke to the audience about the making of the film and the audience was able to ask questions — this is one of my favorite benefits of being a member of the Warren Report (if you live in Seattle, I highly recommend this).

I thought it was interesting that when the soldier was asked a politically leaning (i.e. democratic-friendly) question, that he had to explain that the soldiers on the ground don’t really think that much about who the President of the United States is — instead, they’re more worried about how their families are getting by back in the States, how their insurance payments are being made, and whether they’re going to return home safe.

I left the screening room (at the Seattle Art Museum) even more respectful for what our troops are doing on the ground in Iraq — while I don’t agree with how we were convinced to enter Iraq, or how Bush is handling/planning it, the soldier’s themselves really are performing heroic work. Sadly, though, I don’t think we’re going to be seeing a quick improvement in Iraq — I fear that the elections and eventual political situation will not go well at all, and that we’re in an almost interminable situation over there.

One last thing — Warren told us that the film has received an ‘R’ rating by the MPAA — that is very disappointing, as I think it would be fantastic for high school students to see this film — the vernacular is very much ‘teenager’, as many of the soldiers were 19-20 years old — after seeing the movie, I was left puzzled by the rating, as there is very little actual shooting or violence — there is a little ‘bad language’, but honestly folks, they’ve heard it before…

Eugene gave us free passes to see ‘The Return’ this evening at the Metro Cinemas in the U-District. It is a Russian film, and we really enjoyed it — I personally prefer to not know the storyline for movies before I see them, so I’ll not spill the beans. That said, it was very fun to leave the theatre with many unanswered questions (why did he return? what was in the box? did they tell anyone what happened after they returned? what was his story?). You won’t be disappointed with this film — now, ïîéäèòå, ñì. ýòî (that’s russian for ‘go see it’ — translation was courtesy of this website)

To cap off the evening, I drove the aforementioned Eugene to the airport… I wonder if he’ll return? 🙂