Thehibikiew Not even bad in a good way

Libramedi Intense, gripping, stylish and poignant

SparkMore n my opinion it was a great movie with some interesting elements, even though having some plot holes and the ending probably was just too messy and crammed together, but still fun to watch and not your casual movie that is similar to all other ones.

Humaira Grant It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

Red_Identity Considering the acclaim for this, perhaps I expected something a little more unconventional. The film, is certainly a fabulous mood piece. The director is not afraid to have different recreations based on different peoples' memories, and he certainly revels in trying to come up with the ambiguities in all of the films. The film does start off ambiguous by the start, but somewhere along the way the scales tip in one side and you're then firmly planted on one of the two sides, and all of this is of course intentional, and there is enough speculation to make you confident in your belief but still not actual evidence, which does leave the whole thing open by the end.

SnoopyStyle In 1976, Dallas police officer Robert W Wood was killed during a traffic stop. His partner was one of the first female police officers in Dallas. The car was stolen and she had problems recalling the event. Randall Dale Adams was eventually convicted for the crime. David Ray Harris had bragged about the killing but later claimed that it was Randall who killed the cop. David had picked up Randall hitchhiking and spend the day together. While Randall claimed to be with his brother, David claimed that he was with Randall who shot the cop.This is a breakthrough Errol Morris documentary. The case itself is interesting and the fact that it actually helped overturn the case is impressive. There is a hypnotic beauty to the reenactments along with the Philip Glass music. The movie does take a little while to lay down the incident. I think a more straight forward recitation of the main facts of the case with narration at the beginning would be better. This is a ground breaking documentary.

Thomas Lingeman The Thin Blue Line had both a fictional and non-fictional feel to it. Most documentaries, today, seem to follow on this same path. Well, at least the good ones do. What gave the film such a non-fictional feel to it were the on camera interviews and the actually shots of the characters written statements; the confession, the newspaper clippings, and court information. It was that hard evidence that grabbed the viewer and threw him in to the documentary. Also, I enjoyed how the characters were placed in front of the camera to help show they were conducting an interview. Even though no questions were asked to them, the audience could still get the feeling that they were being prosecuted right then and there. There were also elements to the story that gave it more of a "Hollywood" feel. This would be the reenactment of the shooting and other parts of the night. It was the overall style of how it was filmed that gave it this tone. They transitioning of different car brands, two different vehicles seemed to dissolve in to each other and the zooming in on the license plate and rear lights. Also, the over-dramatic slow motion close up of the milk shake seemed very "Hollywood". I have not viewed many documentaries outside of the ones from class, the ones I have seen are mostly sports related. I am not very familiar with the troubled conviction of old school documents. To me, The Thin Blue Line seemed to fit with the other documents that I have seen. However, I did find The Thin Blue Line to be very manipulative and deceiving. The whole time they are constantly trying to trick you about who the actual killer is. They did a great job confusing the audience in many ways; the actual story, who to cheer for, and are these cops corrupt.

Cosmoeticadotcom The film has often been likened to Akira Kurosawa's fictive film- also about a murder, Rashomon. The problem with that analogy is that, in the Kurosawa film, one has no basis by which to know which of the several versions of the killing are correct. In The Thin Blue Line- both from the many tellings and the way Morris presents them, it's obvious that Adams is innocent and Harris is guilty. The only Rashomon like thing is the fact that re-enacted tellings of the shooting all vary, from the two principals, to the cops' claims, to those made by the assorted witnesses who, in actuality, saw nothing. The fact that the many re-enactments are at odds with Morris's clear view that Adams was innocent is a minor failing of the film, and shows Morris was still trying to live up to the dictum that a documentary has to be (or try to be) objective in its presentation of its facts. But, in a case where the evidence is so incontrovertibly one-sided, is such an effort worth it, dramatically or aesthetically? I think not, and films like Barbara Kopple's Harlan County, USA are proof of my claim. The title of the film comes from the old notion that a thin line of cops (hence the blue) is all that saves civilization from its own worst instincts. The judge who sentenced Adams, when recounting the summation of the DA, tells how he almost teared up at hearing the use of the term. The film, however, turns the title on its side and shows how that same line can be used as a tool for injustice, suppression of evidence, and the oppression of innocents. And it is this perversion of 'justice' that can hasten society's fall far more than the mere absence of that thin blue line.The Thin Blue Line is both a landmark and important film, but those claims are not equivalent to calling it a great film. Arguments can be made, in which case a claim for near greatness may be apt, but not greatness. Compared to the documentaries of Morris's friend and mentor, Werner Herzog, The Thin Blue Line still has a far greater affinity to the sort of straightforward documentaries to be found on PBS shows like Frontline. However, the fact that it did great things- freed an innocent man and held up the so-called justice system to the greater scrutiny it deserves (be it for capital crimes or those as trivial as phony traffic tickets issued to meet monthly quotas)- is indisputable, and that makes it an important film. From a cinematic perspective, the best thing this still rather linear film did was bridge Morris's path from his early quirky documentaries to his later, greater films, like The Fog Of War, which is more clearly in the Herzogian mode. And, for that trajectory, alone, the world of cinema should be grateful.