Chris Knipp Writing: Movies, Politics, Art


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PostPosted: Sat Jul 26, 2014 8:40 am 
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SPC. ADAM WINFIELD IN THE KILL TEAM

Trapped in the horrors of war

The Kill Team focuses on a trial of American soldiers for war crimes in Afghanistan. Dan Krauss (cinematographer for Daniel Ellsberg and the Pentagon Papers, Inequality for All, and other documentaries), provides an intense, claustrophobic view of this trial achieved notably by volunteering for pro bono filming assistance to the defense of one of the defendants, Spc. Adam Winfield. He appears to have been able to retain ownership of the footage. He covers the ordeal of Winfield's parents in the lead-up to the trial and provides footage shot by soldiers in the field, and revealing interviews with Winfield's fellow soldiers, Specialists Jeromy Morlock, Andrew Holmes, and Justin Stoner as well as Adam Winfield himself. Morlock got 24 years, Holmes 7; Stoner went free and got an honorable discharge. Ironically perhaps, Winfield got 3 years, though he seems to have been released after one year post-trial. All were members of a platoon in the Army 5th Stryker Brigade, Second Infantry Division, deployed near Kandahar. We don't hear from Staff Sergeant Calvin Gibbs, platoon leader and instigator, who was sentenced to life. But this is experience viewed under a microscope, and powerful stuff.

The soldiers describe being sent to Kandahar province in 2010 and encountering a world of intense boredom. They were trained to kill, yet find they are to "help" the locals. They are in danger of death or dismemberment from IUD's whenever they go out and can't think of Afghans as their friends. Only 19 or 20, they're young, impressionable, bored, and trained to kill. They learn soldiers are known to live up to that training as killers in the absence of legitimate opportunity by carrying out murders and covering them up. It's easy: you and your buddy plant a weapon or fire off a grenade and make it look like the victim was armed and a threat. This is no My Lai: this trial involved "only" three known murders. But the "Maywant district killings," as the case is referred to, in which 11 of 12 soldiers charged were sentenced, is unlikely to be a unique instance.

Staff Sergeant Gibbs, an Iraq war veteran with skulls tattooed along one leg (we see a snapshot) to designate "dudes" he's killed, arrived after the others were there as the platoon's new leader. He bragged of killing for sport in Iraq and promised to do the same here, the soldiers say. And so it soon begins to happen, with help from a few other platoon members. After the first killing, Adam Winfield told his father Christopher, an ex-Marine, that murder was going on. Adam was deeply troubled, but he did not do anything directly. When Christopher finally reached military authorities he was told unless another soldier came along to back up his son, nothing would be done.

The tipping point was not Adam, but Justin Stoner, who reported drug use by other solders because it was where he bunked. He got beat up by Gibbs and others: "snitches get stiches," the sergeant said. This came to the attention of authorities, and an investigation seems to have brought out the rest.

By this time Adam Winfield, who'd been beaten too, for his doubts, had been lured or coerced into sharing with Gibbs and Morlock in one of the murders. His statements are confused as to whether he fired into or away from the body of the victim, but apparently in the plea bargain where he pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter he acknowledged only firing away from the body but doing nothing to prevent the killing.

Stoner is described elsewhere as a whistleblower, but in the interview not only says he doesn't want to be called that but wishes he'd never reported anything. Morlock makes a case for how easy it was for him and his young colleagues to be led into wrongdoing by their platoon leader in the atmosphere of the time and place. Winfidld is more a case of guilt and sorrow, and he reports struggling at one point with suicidal thoughts.

Despite Manohla Dargis's criticism in the New York Times that Krauss makes his focus too narrow and misleads with his title, this seems clearly one of the most explosive American documentaries of the year. David Edelstein calls it "an essential film no matter what your political convictions."

Another source on this story is the original 2011 article by Mark Boal in Rolling Stone. The events occurred in 2010. Some notes on the trial can be found in a blog of the Tacoma News Tribune which has articles about the trial, platoon leader Gibbs's "dark side" and the toll of courts martial on the families of the accueed.

The Kill Team, 77 mins., debuted at Tribeca 6 April 2013 (winning the Grand Jury Prize) and showed at San Francisco, Miami, London and Warsaw festivals, among others. Its release by Oscilloscope begins in NYC at Lincoln Center 25 July 2014 and continues to eight other cities through September 2014. Metacritic rating 71% (8 reviews).

THE KILL TEAM will open under the auspices of the San Francisco Film Society in the San Francisco area with Q&As expected with Dan Krauss as follows: Friday, Aug 1, 7:20 & Sunday Aug 3, 4:30 at Landmark Opera Plaza Cinemas; Saturday Aug 2, 7:35 at Landmark Shattuck Cinemas.

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©Chris Knipp. Blog: http://chrisknipp.blogspot.com/.


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