"Control Room" -Feature Documentary

“Control Room” was educational and powerful. I did not think that the situation in Iraq was so dire and out of hand at times that people who did not have anything to do with it had to end up getting hurt. Yet, in all war, this is unfortunately the case. The film does well to present a point of view that had often been overlooked or seen as a darker side from common media networks seen in American television. People would probably erroneously connect Al-Jezeera network with Al-Kaida. They transmit video from them but it does not mean they agree with what they are doing. They portray things that are seen as controversial by the U.S. media networks and government, but it is because the footage they show in their network is something that the administration did not want to show at least to the American public. I really saw the tensions build up between people who supported the footage shown on the network as “as it truly is” and the people who did not want it shown because it was too much to handle. Sometimes the truth is harsh and reality can be a bitter place to be afterwards. No one likes to be reminded, but for media to remind the public of something means that hopefully it doesn’t happen again in history. This piece was very informative. It really help me get past some stereotypes that I might have been guilty of associating, like for example, that I thought a society in Iraq would not have permitted women to work and in the film there was a woman at work as a producer I believe. If I remember right. Sometimes people have to see beyond what is being presented. Films like these are not mainstream here but can inform people of different perspectives and different ways of thinking in other places. Documentaries like this one can certainly take us to these points of view when otherwise there would be no way of doing so just by mainstream alone.