Whaddya Know

THE UNKNOWN KNOWN (B+) - Adjust your expectations. You'd think Errol Morris has us set up for a sequel to "The Fog of War," his haunting psychological examination of '60s Defense Secretary Robert McNamara, from 2003. But his one-on-one with last decade's secretary of war, Donald Rumsfeld, has less depth and more deft.

Even Rumsfeld's biggest detractors will have to acknowledge that the man has charm, if not much else personality-wise. You get the sense that Morris, the pre-eminent art-house documentarian of his time, set out to make "Fog of War II," but changed game plans when he encountered the ultimate technocrat who makes the former head of Ford and architect of Vietnam look like a flower child. Did Morris actually fall a bit for his subject -- and that impish smile?

Morris has a solid hook: the tens of thousands of casual memos that Rumsfeld issued during a career stretching back to the '60s as a congressman, through the Nixon and Ford administrations (and his first tour of duty as military secretary) and his reign during the second Bush presidency overseeing the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. They were known as snowflakes (because they were ubiquitous and dispatched on white paper), giving Morris a lazy visual metaphor that he overuses. The director gets his subject to read the memos on camera, providing a revealing running commentary.

Rumsfeld was a congenital rule-follower. One memo verbally slaps Condoleezza Rice for violating the chain of command and the Chinese wall between National Security and Defense. He obsesses over the definitions of words ("terrorism," "victory," "several" (!)) although he insists on using the "Pentagon dictionary," whatever that is. The disorganization of the Ford White House irritated him. Even his marriage proposal, which he says was executed "imperfectly," had a rational basis in simply not wanting another man to beat him to the hand of a good woman. Only once does Rumsfeld show emotion (relating the story of a miraculous recovery by a wounded fighter at Walter Reed), and you get the undeniable impression that it's a manufactured moment.

Morris digs out fascinating little nuggets, like a tape of Nixon telling Haldeman and Kissinger to "dump" the smug opportunist. He uses a Tennessee Ernie Ford Christmas song to quaintly mark the fall of Saigon, while the 9/11 attacks are conveyed through an image amid the clouds while we hear the recording of air-traffic control vainly requesting a reply from the cockpit of American 11. (Compare that with the devastating images of the firebombing of Japan from "Fog of War." Are we pulling punches here?)

Rumsfeld, ever the good soldier, rarely flinches or breaks format. He refuses to acknowledge that any American would ever have gotten the impression from the Bush administration that Saddam Hussein was somehow connected to 9/11. He believes in the power of reason and intellectual rigor to solve problems, though he acknowledges the folly of trying to account for every potential move the enemy can make. (He's partial to the idea of "failure of imagination.") Whereas McNamara practically melted into a puddle of guilt before the camera, Rumsfeld is emboldened by the verbal jousting match here (certain that he'll emerge victorious, if only on points). Self-described as "cool, measured," there is not a jot of remorse on display; he has the cockiness of the privileged, the confidence of an Ivy League coxswain -- an arrogant man who knows that history is an imperfect social science and will never trip him up.

A healthy competition develops between the two men. Rumsfeld gloats over his own perceived debating victory when rebutting Morris' characterization of the Department of Justice's terror memos. (And for extra credit, he claims he "never read them. I'm not a lawyer; what would I know?") Morris gets his own jab in, after Rumsfeld slanders Hussein as a vainglorious dictator surrounded by his own image in pictures and statues, the mad man believing his own PR and becoming a caricature. "He was living his image of himself, which was pretend," Rumsfeld scolds. Morris then silently holds the camera on Rumsfeld, refusing to cut away as the words echo in our ears. The suggestion is that Morris is reflecting that comment back on Rumsfeld himself. It's a juvenile staring contest. Eventually Rumsfeld blinks. Finally: Cut!

But Morris saves his best shot for last. After allowing Rumsfeld to make his own case for autocratic infallibility, Morris picks apart one of the greatest hits from Rummy's wartime burlesque show before the media -- the famous "known knowns / unknown unknowns" shtick. After hearing it echo a few times throughout the film, you'll probably notice that Rumsfeld's interpretation of the phrase "unknown knowns" is flawed. How does Rumsfeld handle his apparent miscue when confronted? Probably as you'd expect him to.