8A - The Michigan Daily - Monday, April 10, 2000
ARTS
MORRIS
Continued from Page 5A
of a script, they see a simultaneous
camera image of Morris talking to
tem. Facing Morris is the same set up
- a camera behind the picture of the
subject that the other camera is shoot-
ing. This allows Morris' subjects to
look directly into the lens and to look
into his eyes at the same time, thus
avoiding the subject's eyes looking to
the side of the camera where the inter-
viewer normally sits.
I'm still sort of learning about the
Interatron. I do see a difference
bctween my interviews now and those
I .did before I began using it," Morris
said. "The Interatron is something that
no one else uses. It's so different and
quite interesting."
In the film, Morris shows a small
anecdote where Leuchter fixes up the
electric chair for the state of Ten-
nessee. Leuchter explains that the
chair is haunted by the spirits of some
of the men who were killed in it and
proudly shows as proof a photograph
he took of the chair in which ghostly
forms seem to writhe in agony.
"The ghost becomes really interest-
ing to me - that's why I included it. It
becomes a metaphor for the whole
problem of the film - or at least the
central question of the film. Namely
who is Fred?" Morris said.
"I look at that photograph," Morris
said, "and see this hand rising and this
face contorted (maybe two faces are
contorted - I see one; Fred sees
many), and I look at the photograph
and say, 'Ah, a doctored photograph, a
double exposure of some kind.'
"But if that's the case, who pro-
duced the double exposure? Fred? Is
he lying and just pretending that he
doesn't know? Or did he do it himself
and then somehow forget that he had
done it - just wishful thinking that it
might be real or he might be able to
sell it. Or was it done by his associate,
and he just wanted to buy into the
bullshit? What's going on?
"It troubles me," Morris continued,
"because it raises exactly the same
questions that are raised about his
his feelings on humanity in general. "I
think the mind is a very mixed up
place," he said. "We like to think it's in
one state or another, like lying or
telling the truth - well, lying and
telling the truth are pretty clear
notions. But whether you know that
we're lying or telling the truth is much
less clear.
"I imagine us - Leuchter and the
rest of us -- as being like a deck of
cards with a lot of things going on at
once. Layers. Part of us play acting,
part of us sincere, part of us disingenu-
ous, part of us for real, part of us
involved knowingly in what we're
doing, other parts being unwitting
actors in some kind of dimly perceived
play. I think it's a mess,"said Morris.
"I think you can ask two kinds of
questions," Morris continued, "Is what
Fred has done, is it bad? Is it even per-
nicious? And the answer is, unequivo-
cally, yes. This is bad stuff. Going to
Auschwitz and desecrating the place
illegally, chipping brick and mortar
from the ruins of Birkenau, is this
bad? Yes. Is appearing at Holocaust
revisionist conferences or at neo-Nazi
rallies in Europe bad? Yes. Very, very;
very bad.
"Then the next kind of question, is
Fred a bad man'? Is he evil? That's
trickier. I would also say to that cs.
But I would say also that he's a nian
not devoid of our sympathy. Perhaps
not of our approval -and I would say
definitely not of our approval because
I disapprove of him.
"But there's something so sad, so
deeply disturbing about the story. Do
people knowingly commit evil or do
they do really rotten things somehow
thinking that they're heroes? This is a
guy who, it's clear. wants to see him-
self as deeply heroic:" Morris said.
Morris clearly gets deeply
involved in his work. He summed up
"Mr. Death" in a few words: "The
film 'Schindler's List' has the rathof
uninteresting thesis that anybody can
be a hero. 'Mr. Death' has the thes
that anybody can think they're a
hero, anybody can write their own
story in their own mind to construe
themselves as heroic."
Photo courtesy of Lion's Gate
Director extraordinaire Errol Morris returns to the earth for grounding inspiration.
Holocaust denial. Does he know what
he's doing? Is he doing it out of some
sort of cynical desire to manipulate
people? Is he's a real bad guy pulling
the strings or is he some sort of inno-
cent dupe, some fall guy, sone moron
or moral imbecile who stumbled into a
Nazi camp and bought into the lying
without thinking about what he was
doing? That is the question. And that
same question arises in that photo-
graph," Morris said.
Working on the film has led Morris
to rethink, at least figure out, some of
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