SIFF 2014: Mirage Men
It's no secret to those who know me well that I have, my entire life, had an interest in the UFO phenomenon. I've read more books in the area than one should probably admit (though it's been a while since that period of binge reading.) I've edited books on the subject. I've interviewed some of the top researchers in the field. I even wrote a book for middle-grade readers on the subject. (I love its lurid purple-and-green cover.) So when SIFF announced it was including a film on the subject in the festival, I had to attend.
Mirage Men (based on or at least related to a book of the same name) examines the UFO phenomenon from the perspective of Rick Doty, a government operative whose job it was, as the web site says, "to deliberately inject absurd UFO rumours into the conspiracy underground to throw Russian spies and overly-curious Americans off the trail of genuine top secret military projects." I wish the story had been that clearly told. The film introduces Doty, and then gets into his destruction of a prominent businessman in the New Mexico region, a guy who started off as a successful businessman and electrical engineer, and ended up being treated at a mental health facility as a result of Doty feeding him disinformation to distract him from watching the testing of experimental aircraft and monitoring government radio frequencies. The filmmakers then broaden their coverage of the story. They interviewed Linda Moulton Howe, a journalist who covered the cattle mutilations of the 1970s and 1980s. They talked to other researchers in the UFO field. The key messages that came across to me were that Doty's a master manipulator, that he mixed truth and fiction to create a smoke screen behind which the government could do its work, and that some of what he disseminated was true. By the end of the film, it was so hard to parse what was and wasn't true and real that the point of the film had been lost along the way.
Or maybe that was the point: to demonstrate that no matter how much they talked to Doty, the truth would never be fully understood because he's a trained liar and his credibility will always be suspect. My great frustration with the film was that its through-line was muddled. I wanted a little more coherence, a little more of a clear arc, and some sort of definitive conclusions. It was interesting, no question, and the stories that were told were chilling and weird and discomforting. I may actually try to see it again at some point to see if I missed something along the way. The film was interesting, certainly, for someone like me, but it isn't nearly as strong as many of the other documentaries I've seen.
On a happy note, I ran into stannex, Shanna Germaine and Monte Cook while I was standing in line and so had excellent company before and during the film. A nice surprise indeed.
Mirage Men (based on or at least related to a book of the same name) examines the UFO phenomenon from the perspective of Rick Doty, a government operative whose job it was, as the web site says, "to deliberately inject absurd UFO rumours into the conspiracy underground to throw Russian spies and overly-curious Americans off the trail of genuine top secret military projects." I wish the story had been that clearly told. The film introduces Doty, and then gets into his destruction of a prominent businessman in the New Mexico region, a guy who started off as a successful businessman and electrical engineer, and ended up being treated at a mental health facility as a result of Doty feeding him disinformation to distract him from watching the testing of experimental aircraft and monitoring government radio frequencies. The filmmakers then broaden their coverage of the story. They interviewed Linda Moulton Howe, a journalist who covered the cattle mutilations of the 1970s and 1980s. They talked to other researchers in the UFO field. The key messages that came across to me were that Doty's a master manipulator, that he mixed truth and fiction to create a smoke screen behind which the government could do its work, and that some of what he disseminated was true. By the end of the film, it was so hard to parse what was and wasn't true and real that the point of the film had been lost along the way.
Or maybe that was the point: to demonstrate that no matter how much they talked to Doty, the truth would never be fully understood because he's a trained liar and his credibility will always be suspect. My great frustration with the film was that its through-line was muddled. I wanted a little more coherence, a little more of a clear arc, and some sort of definitive conclusions. It was interesting, no question, and the stories that were told were chilling and weird and discomforting. I may actually try to see it again at some point to see if I missed something along the way. The film was interesting, certainly, for someone like me, but it isn't nearly as strong as many of the other documentaries I've seen.
On a happy note, I ran into stannex, Shanna Germaine and Monte Cook while I was standing in line and so had excellent company before and during the film. A nice surprise indeed.