Last night I watched the Milos Forman film “Goya’s Ghosts”.  The movie was made in 2006, but never received widespread distribution in the United States.  This despite the fact Milos Forman is a highly regarded, Academy Award winning director (“One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest”, “Amadeus”), and despite the fact it features three acclaimed leading actors, Javier Bardem, Natalie Portman, and Stellan Skarsgard. 

As I watched the film, I couldn’t help but notice the similarities in its storyline to current events, especially the war in Iraq, and the treatment of terror suspects held in American custody.  I suspect the similarities were not unintentional. 

Natalie Portman plays the teenage daughter of a wealthy aristocratic family in late 18^th Century Spain.  Stellan Skarsgard portrays the artist Francisco Goya, who has been commissioned to paint her portrait.  Javier Bardem is a priest who has been appointed as an inquisitor in the newly reinstated Spanish Inquisition.  The plot is driven by the arrest of Portman on false charges of covertly practicing Judaism.  As her inquisitor, Bardem is able to elicit a false confession, condemning her to a life of horror in the dungeons of the Inquisition.  Here she remains until the invading armies of Napoleon overthrow the Spanish monarchy, arrest the Inquisitors, and free the prisoners.  The story does not end there, however.  It follows the main characters through the downfall of Napoleon’s puppet Spanish regime.

Natalie Portman has no idea why she was summoned to appear before the Inquisitors.  At first, she doesn’t even know what the accusation against her is.  Facing extreme torture, she is told only that she must confess the truth.  Finally, suffering intense agony, she pleads with Javier Bardem, her inquisitor, “Tell me what the truth is!” 

Later, Bardem is confronted by Portman’s parents.  The tables are reversed, and Portman’s father inflicts the same treatment on Bardem that he had inflicted on Portman.  To stop the torture, Bardem must confess that he is the bastard son of a chimpanzee and orangutan, sent to earth to debauch the Catholic Church.  It does not take long for Bardem to admit to that exact absurdity.

One cannot watch these scenes without being reminded that Americans are eliciting “confessions” from prisoners by using the same techniques that were employed by the Inquisition hundreds of years ago.   

Did prisoners in American custody plead with their inquisitors, “Tell me what the truth is!”

The similarities between the movie and reality don’t end there.  The film’s inquisitors never use the word “torture”.  Instead, a much more polite euphemism is employed.  The prisoners are subjected to “the question”.  I was reminded that America does not “torture” either.  We use “enhanced interrogation techniques”.   Such euphemisms are much more palatable than a harsh word like “torture”.

Mid way through the movie, Napoleon’s army marches on Spain with great revolutionary fervor.  The French general tells his army that the oppressed people of Spain will welcome the French army as liberators.  The Spanish army will lay down its arms and join the French in overthrowing the Spanish crown.  Compare that to what our own Vice President said on the eve of invading Iraq:  “there is no question but what they want to the get rid of Saddam Hussein and they will welcome as liberators the United States when we come to do that.” 

Of course, it didn’t work out that way in Iraq, and it didn’t work out that way in Spain in the early 19^th century.  War spawns atrocity.  As the French come to liberate the Spaniards, the film treats us to scenes of civilian carnage and rape.  We see the desecration of a church, and the murder of a priest.  We are reminded of the terrible reality of war – every war, not just the ones fought 200 years ago.      

As a film, “Goya’s Ghosts” may not be quite the same caliber as Milos Foreman’s Oscar winning movies of the 1970’s and 1980’s.  But as a metaphor for America under George W. Bush, it is a film that should not be missed.