Roger Ebert has said, "After twenty years of reviewing films, I haven't found another filmmaker who intrigues me more...Errol Morris is like a magician, and as great a filmmaker as Hitchcock or Fellini." More




There'll be no learning period with nuclear weapons. You make one mistake and you're going to destroy nations.




Loaned your copy of Fast, Cheap and Out of Control to your ex? Forgot to get your dad a father's day gift? Visit the store.



Nubar Alexanian, still photographer for Fast Cheap and Out of Control, Mr. Death and the Fog of War.

Kyle Cooper, designer of the animated sequences included the main and end credits for Standard Operating Procedure.

Elsa Dorfman photographed Errol's film subjects and family since 1990.

Bill Drenttel, Michael Bierut, and Betsy Vardell, designers of these web pages, are partners of Winterhouse, Pentagram and RubyStudio, respectively, and contributors to Design Observer.

Danny Elfman, composer of the score for Standard Operating Procedure.

Robert Fernandez represents Errol for commercial work at Moxie Pictures.

Philip Glass, composer of the scores for Fog of War, Thin Blue Line and Brief History of Time.

Philip Gourevitch, author of the book Standard Operating Procedure is also the editor for the Paris Review.

Steve Hardie, production designer for Fog of War and many commercials.

John Kusiak, composer of the musical scores for the First Person television series and numerous television commercials.

Mark Lipson, producer and still photographer for Thin Blue Line.

Ron Rosenbaum, author of Explaining Hitler and columnist for The New York Observer.

Randy Thom and John Nutt, sound designers for Standard Operating Procedure work out of Skywalker Sound.

Jeff Selis, author of Cat Spelled Backwards Doesn't Spell God and agency producer of the Miller High Life campaign.

Tim Onosko, has completed a documentary Lost Vegas: The Lounge Era. It is narrated - like my Cisco commercials - by Ricky Jay.

Errol's latest film, Standard Operating Procedure, will be released on April 25th. The Sony Pictures Classics website is now online. The trailer is now available on apple.com.



The Believer
Werner Herzog talks with Errol Morris

"FOR YOU TO STEAL A CHARACTER OR A STORY ISN'T REAL THEFT. BUT TO STEAL A LANDSCAPE, THAT IS A VERY, VERY SERIOUS CRIME."

Things Werner Herzog and Errol Morris have done together: Visited serial killer Ed Kemper in prison Visited Plainfield, Wisconsin, to investigate the murderer Ed Gein Dug up Ed Gein's mother's grave to see if she was still there (almost)



Standard Operating Procedure, the first documentary ever shown in competition at the Berlin film festival, won the Silver Bear Jury Grand Prize.











Loosetooth.com

Brandy Agerbeck comments on the recent lecture by Errol at the Chicago Humanities Festival. The transcript will soon be available.



The Believer
Adam Curtis talks with Errol Morris

On October 31, 2005, Errol Morris, Academy Award winning director of The Fog of War, interviewed Adam Curtis, director of "The Power of Nightmares", the documentary film which asks the question "Did Johnny Mercer bring down the World Trade Center?"



The Stop Smiling Interview with Errol Morris
by James Hughes / Photograph by Nubar Alexanian

No matter how despairing the tale, Errol Morris, the 58-year-old filmmaker and self-described "secular antihumanist," can't get enough of people and the wealth of stories they have to tell. "They're not adversarial interviews," Morris said by phone from Cambridge, Massachusetts, his home of 16 years. "They're interviews where I encourage people to talk at length."



Projects that should have, could have, would have, might have happened but didn't.

Can optical illusions help to re-define a brand?
Ricky Jay visiting with Errol Morris in an Ames Room built by Steve Hardie for Quaker Oats at Hollywood Center Studios.



(This lecture was given at Harvard and includes clips for Vernon, Florida, The Thin Blue Line, and The Fog of War.)
Vernon, Florida - The Sand that Grows



(Why does Sara Jane crawl into a crate addressed to Ryberg Electronics? Was an Interociter delivered to the set of Imitation of Life?)

This Island Earth (1955) Directed by Joseph Newman

Imitation of Life (1959) Directed by Douglas Sirk



Projects that should have, could have, would have, might have happened but didn't.



I was hired by IBM to make a film for the year 2000. It was for an "in house" conference of IBM employees.





NPR, All Things Considered - May 2, 2005

I believe in truth. And in the pursuit of truth.

When I was ten years old, I asked a neighborhood kid who was older than me: Which city is further west ? Reno, Nevada or Los Angeles, California? The correct answer is Reno, Nevada. But he was convinced that it was the other way around.








This is a slightly modified version of the editorial published in The New York Times, January 18, 2005.

So why is George W. Bush taking the oath of office this week and not John Kerry? For me, the answer is clear: Mr. Kerry failed because of his inability to tell his own story. John Kerry could have presented to the American people his full biography, but instead he chose to edit who he was. Why?



1. Preventive bite. Hand is bound to betray you eventually. Get it before it gets you. Remember, every hand is capable of naked aggression.
2. Preemptive bite. Hand is ready to do something. Just look at it. You've got to protect yourself, don't you?
3. Keeps gums healthy.
4. Hand less likely poisoned than food.
5. Tastes good.



This is a slightly modified version of the editorial published in The New York Times, November 20, 2004.

All of life seems to be about denial — the denial of death, the denial of reality, the denial of everything that it is convenient for us to deny. Photography because of its causal relationship to the world seems to give us the truth or something close to the truth. I am skeptical about this for many reasons. But even if photography doesn't give us truth on a silver-platter, it can make it harder for us to deny reality. It puts a leash on fantasy, confabulation and self-deception. It provides constraints, borders. It circumscribes our ability to lie — to ourselves and to others.






Projects that should have, could have, would have, might have happened but didn't.



"The Donald" played by Donald Trump

"Charles Foster Kane" played by Orson Welles
Continue with the discussion...


10.26.04: Fox News and Accidental Bias
10.27.04: The Flip Flopper vs. The Prisoner of His Own Ideology
10.28.04: Preemptive vs. Preventive War
11.03.04: Potterville

The book version of Standard Operating Procedure written by Philip Gourevitch and Errol.


The soundtrack for Standard Operating Procedure by Danny Elfman.

Am I supposed to object to this? ...


The New Yorker website has posted an excerpt from the book, Standard Operating Procedure, as well as video clips from the film.

Ron Rosenbaum writes about Errol's blog post for the New York Times, Cartesian Blogging, Part One.

Only the unimaginative carpenter...


Watch Errol's Full Tilt Poker Spots.



Watch the Short Film Errol made for the opening of the Oscars and 2002.

Then see how many people you recognized.

Isn't everybody familiar with Anselm's ontological proof of the existence of God?




Watch Errol's Hewlett Packard spot shot in Helsinki back in 2000.


Watch two of the finished Quaker Ames Room spots.

Also watch a flash animated explaination of how Steve Hardie built the Ames Room used in the commercials.

I look at the world of fauna and flora around me, and it becomes completely obvious that it can not be explained by the processes of natural selection.

Natural selection would have done a better job.


Updated with twenty "more" spots for a total of Eighty.

This updated encylcopedia of High-Life material also includes the only apocalyptic High-Life spot - Staying Alert.

(If you are interested in other apocalyptic commercials, see the Southern Comfort spot - Bomb Shelter.)

I am a secular anti-humanist.

Interrotron v. Interociter

Interrotron

Interociter


Ron Rosenbaum, the Edgy Enthusiast at the New York Observer, has written about The Fog of War, Mr. Death, and Gates of Heaven.

He has also written an article about pessimism which includes a reference to The Grump (no. 3), Cursing the Darkness.

Errol wrote the foreword to his book, The Secret Parts of Fortune.


The story of Pandora and the box is well-known.

The story has a simple beginning. Pandora was presented with a box and asked not to open it.

Well, big surprise.




Updated with the emmy award winning commercial for PBS, "Photo Booth".

As well as, the campaigns for Volkswagen, Southern Comfort, Robertson Stephens, and Adidas.

I have always been perplexed by Faulkner's Nobel Prize Banquet Speech. Not merely endure? Will prevail?

I have often heard people say that "The Thin Blue Line" got an innocent man out of prison.

Yes and no.

The movie brought the case to national attention, but it was my investigation ? part of which was done with a movie camera ? that got Randall Adams out of prison. Here's the story.
More


Oxymorons. What are they? I grabbed a definition from the American Heritage Dictionary.

ox-y-mo-ron
A rhetorical figure in which incongruous or contradictory terms are combined, as in a deafening silence and a mournful optimist.

The Seed Salon

Marc Hauser and Errol discuss game theory, Stanley Milgram, and whether science can make us better people in Seed Magazine.

Sebald, Byrne, Morris

Bernie Michalik writes about Standard Operating Procedure on his blog Smart People I Know.

Objective Truth

David Byrne reviews Standard Operating Procedure on his Journal.

How We See

Adam O. Thomas reviews Standard Operating Procedure for Only Magazine.

Interrogation Practices

Kenneth Turan reviews Standard Operating Procedure L.A. Times.

Holding Them Responsible

Ty Burr reviews Standard Operating Procedure for The Boston Globe.

At Abu Ghraib

Peter Rainer reviews Standard Operating Procedure for The Christian Science Monitor.

On Film

The Chicago Reader picks Standard Operating Procedure as a Critics Choice for this weekend.

Scott Tobias reviews Standard Operating Procedure for The Onion.

Studio 360

Kurt Anderson talks to Errol about Standard Operating Procedure on Studio 360.
Guest observer Teddy Blanks reviews Standard Operating Procedure on the Design Observer website.

The Harper's Magazine website has a question and answer between W.J.T. Mitchell and Errol.

Listen to Errol talk about Standard Operating Procedure on NPR's Day to Day.

David Samuels profiles Errol in the current issue of Wired Magazine.

Chris Wisniewski reviews Standard Operating Procedure for Indiewire.

Errol is featured in this month's GQ written by Chris Heath.

Christopher Dickey reviews Standard Operating Procedure for Newsweek.

In the May issue of Harper's W.J.T. Mitchell reviews Standard Operating Porcedure.



Order Nubar Alexanian's book of photograps of Errol's sets.


Standard Operating Procedure, a book written by Philip Gourevitch and Errol Morris to be published by Penguin Press on May 15, 2008.

Ron Rosenbaum writes about Errol's use of slow motion in Standard Operating Porcedure for Slate.

A question and answer with Errol in print and video from the Columbia Journalism Review by Michael Meyer.

Creativity Magazine lists Errol as one of the Creativity 50. A list of the top fifty minds in advertising over the past twenty years.

Listen to Errol talk about the truth on Christopher Lydon's radio show "Open Source"

The Onion's "A.V. Club" has a interview with Errol talking about his movies recently release on DVD.

The Thin Blue Line, Vernon, Florida, Gates of Heaven, and all of the episodes of First Person are now on dvd.

Check out the Store for details.

The Fog of War book by James G. Blight and Janet M. Lang.

The Onion's "A.V. Club" has a interview with Errol talking about his movies recently release on DVD.

Mike Clark of USA Today writes that "two of the best non-fiction films ever Gates of Heaven and The Thin Blue Line come to DVD from MGM/Sony." on July 26th

FLM Magazine Summer 2005 issue contains an article by Errol about the upcoming DVD Collection release.

Errol wins Outstanding Achievement Award at Hot Docs Festival in Toronto.

Hiawatha Bray, of the Boston Globe, uses Errol's Sharp campaign as an example of an alternate reality game.

Stuart Elliott, of the New York Times, writes about Errol's new campaign for HSBC.

Advertising Age gives a farewell tribute to Miller's Highlife Man.



The Harvard University Gazette's Rob Meyer writes that nine Nobelists, a Fields medalist, and an Oscar winner converged on Harvard. It was in honor of Sidney Coleman.

The Weston Town Crier writes about Errol's recent appearance at the Cambridge School of Weston.

Adweek named Errol Morris as one of the brightest talents in advertising today.

Nancy Ramsey quotes Errol Morris in her New York Times piece about the future of political film making.

Errol Morris and Kurt Andersen looked at how writers and artists reshape history last week on Studio 360.

The Guardian named Errol Morris in the top ten of the world's 40 best directors.

One's company, two's a crowd.


October, 2004
GOTHAMIST: This election year, this political climate and national divide has become overwhelmingly stressful. I say this for myself, but I know it's true of a great number of other people.