‘Control Room’: All the news America doesn’t see fit to print

One of the essential questions of journalism involves news reporting in war time.

What is the difference between reporting the truth and aiding the enemy? How does a reporter strike the right balance between informing the public and courting treason?

For the serious journalist, there are no easy answers. And that is especially true in an era when pressure comes from all sides, from the government and certain corners of the overall culture, to abdicate professional responsibility and become a cheerleader for the home team (see: “embedded” journalist).

In the midst of this ongoing debate comes “Control Room,” a documentary that looks at how the war in Iraq is being reported. The difference between this film and, say, Robert Greenwald’s controversial film “Outfoxed: Rupert Murdoch’s War on Journalism” is that “Control Room” doesn’t look at what news the American public is getting.

Its focus is what we aren’t getting.

In 2003, director Jehane Noujaim (“Startup.com”), a Harvard- educated native of Egypt, took a couple of cameras and some sound equipment to Qatar, headquarters of the Arab television news service al-Jazeera. Noujaim’s intent was to study not only what al-Jazeera is – namely a broadcast company that serves millions of viewers, primarily in the Arab world – but what it does.

Noujaim’s timing was good. Since her crew was in Iraq during the 30-odd day war, viewers get to see footage not carried by U.S. companies, including camera angles that show Saddam Hussein’s statue being pulled down by a small group of Arab men instead of the cheering throngs that were featured on CNN, BBC and major newspapers such as the Washington Post.

At the same time, Noujaim takes pains to humanize the characters that she follows – former BBC reporter Hassan Ibrahim, senior producer Sameer Khader and even U.S. Marine press spokesman Josh Rushing. The result is a film that is as eye-opening as it is troubling.

Yet here’s what “Control Room” isn’t. It isn’t Michael Moore grandstanding. It isn’t Robert Greenwald muckraking. And it isn’t Rupert Murdoch cheerleading.

It is, instead, a calmly made look at an Arab news service that, to be fair, gives its Arab audience the news that audience wants to see. Al-Jazeera has been attacked by Donald Rumsfeld, among others, as being “willing to lie to make their case.” Yet if that’s true, it’s also true that, at one time or another, al-Jazeera has been censored by such Arab governments as Jordan, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Iraq.

Sometimes, “Control Room” shows, the truth is in the angles.

And to paraphrase Patrick Henry, if that’s treason, then al-Jazeera is making the most of it.