***UPDATE AND RETRACTION: As pointed out by Nickrud below, screenwriter Mark Boal, who wrote "The Hurt Locker" after a lengthy embed with U.S. Troops, has now responded to Scahill's article.
For the record:
After The Nation's coverage of the New York Times blog was originally posted, the Hurt Locker screenwriter Mark Boal contacted The Nation. "As the producer and supervising producer on set, I can say that The Hurt Locker never hired Blackwater in any capacity on this movie.
(CONTINUED AFTER THE JUMP)
We did hire a number of former military personnel as advisors, as well as guys from the Jordanian military," says Boal, who supervised all of the hiring of military consultants for the film. "I think Anthony [Mackie] was doing a kind of stunt where the Oscar blogger for the Times was going to shoot paint guns with him. I think he was using the term Blackwater colloquially to refer to contractors or mercenaries, which we had plenty of on set." When asked about comments made by the film's director, Kathryn Bigelow, in other interviews mentioning the presence of Blackwater men on set, including as technical advisers, Boal said, "It's possible that at some point somebody on set worked for Blackwater, but we never hired Blackwater."
Consider this a retraction. Let the indignant flames commence. ;-)
ORIGINAL DIARY:
Jeremey Scahill, who has done some of the best reporting on Blackwater during the past few years, has a new piece up at the Nation. The gist:
One of the stars of the widely acclaimed Iraq war film The Hurt Locker has revealed that the filmmakers hired the mercenary firm Blackwater while shooting the film in the Middle East, including in Palestinian refugee camps in Jordan. Blackwater, whose operatives are accused of killing innocent civilians, has an office in Jordan and has trained Jordanian military forces.
The Hurt Locker is one of the most powerful films to be released in 2009. It's been nominated for multiple awards in nearly every contest of the year, and is likely to dominate this year's Oscars. It pains me to say it, but this news, if true, trumps the artistic achievement of the film itself.
Having worked on many films myself, I know that it's standard practice to hire off-duty or ex-military personnel to serve as technical advisors. The skills our troops learn aren't easy to reproduce without guidance, and instruction is almost always necessary, particularly on a film which details military operations as intimately as The Hurt Locker. But I have never - ever - heard of mercenary outfits like Blackwater being paid as consultants.
The Hurt Locker was filmed in Jordan in the late summer of 2007. This was just before the Nisoor Square massacre, but long after it had become clear that Blackwater was murdering Iraqi civilians with impunity. Here are just a few items from Blackwater's pre-Hurt-Locker career, from their Wikipedia entry:
On February 16, 2005, four Blackwater guards escorting a U.S. State Department convoy fired 70 bullets into an Iraqi's car. The guards stated that they felt threatened by the car's approach. The fate of the car's driver was unknown because the convoy did not stop after the shooting. An investigation by the State Department's Diplomatic Security Service concluded that the shooting was not justified and that the Blackwater employees provided false statements to investigators. The false statements claimed that the one of the Blackwater vehicles had been hit by insurgent gunfire, but the investigation found that one of the Blackwater guards had actually fired into his own vehicle.
On Christmas Eve 2006, a security guard of the Iraqi vice president, Adel Abdul Mahdi, was shot and killed while on duty outside the Iraqi prime minister's compound. The Iraqi government has accused Andrew J. Moonen, at the time an employee of Blackwater USA, of murdering him while drunk. Moonen was subsequently fired by Blackwater for "violating alcohol and firearm policy", and travelled from Iraq to the United States days after the incident. United States Attorneys are currently investigating. The United States State Department and Blackwater USA had attempted to keep his identity secret. Despite the Blackwater incident, Moonen found subsequent employment.
In late May 2007, Blackwater contractors opened fire on the streets of Baghdad twice in two days, one of the incidents provoking a standoff between the security contractors and Iraqi Interior Ministry commandos, according to U.S. and Iraqi officials. On May 30, 2007, Blackwater employees shot an Iraqi civilian deemed to have been "driving too close" to a State Department convoy that was being escorted by Blackwater contractors.
A sniper employed by Blackwater Worldwide opened fire from the roof of the Iraqi Justice Ministry, killing three guards working for the state-funded Iraqi Media Network on February 6, 2006. According to the 13 witnesses who were present, the guards had not fired on the Justice Ministry. An Iraqi police report described the shootings as "an act of terrorism" and said Blackwater "caused the incident." Iraqi Media Network concluded that the guards were killed "without any provocation."
As much as I enjoyed The Hurt Locker, and appreciate its power as a work of art, this choice on the part of the filmmakers to enter into a financial relationship with one of the most reprehensible groups to come out of the Bush foreign policy nightmare is simply inexcusable. There was no doubt in the summer of 2007 that Blackwater had gone beyond the pale. There was no excuse for hiring them.
The producers of this film should be held up as an example.
I urge you to boycott The Hurt Locker.
Don't spend money on it. Recommend that others not spend money on it.
And if you know anyone in a position to vote in this year's awards celebrations, please urge them not to vote for it.
Thanks for taking the time to think about this.