Profs Expose U.S. ‘Secrecy’

“Secrecy is something like a forbidden fruit. You can’t have it, and that makes you want it more.” Thus opens “Secrecy,” a documentary on government security classification made by two Harvard professors from disparate fields—one, a professor of Visual and Environmental Studies (VES) and one a scientist and historian. The film’s unique appeal drew a crowd of over 60 members of the Harvard History of Science Colloquia to a special preview screening in the Science Center on Tuesday.

SECRETS AND LIES

“Secrecy” was made by Arnheim Lecturer on Filmmaking Robb Moss and Pellegrino University Professor Peter L. Galison. It explores government secrets—not with the aim of exposing them but of giving an outline to their nebulous nature in the context of democracy and its sustainability.

Though at the screening Galison jokingly called the film an “impossible project” due to the impenetrability of secrets, Moss said the intent was to add a third dimension to secrecy’s “two-dimensional world” of paper.

The film combines historical footage, interviews, and animation. Grainy historical clips of American conflicts are juxtaposed with post-Sept. 11 images in order to present evidence for both the benefits and perils of government secrecy.

Examples of heightened security like the Manhattan Project and the Cold War highlight the importance of information secrecy, while political atrocities such as the Abu Ghraib scandal illuminate how secrecy can be used as a shroud to condone harm and, as one film interviewee describes, to “dip back into the well of evil in the human soul.”

The film is narrated only by a portentous score from local composer John Kusiak.

REVEALING THE TRUTH

In a question-and-answer session following the screening, Moss and Galison said that the intent of the event was to gauge reaction and open dialogue before the film’s anticipated release this summer.

“We’d like [‘Secrecy’] to be part of a discussion that is piecemeal,” Galison said, “something that precipitates asking questions.”

The filmmakers said they shaped the idea for “Secrecy” in their jointly-taught class, History of Science 152, “Filming Science,” over the past three years. The class interactively juxtaposes film and text to explore science.

“While text handles exposition decisively in a way film doesn’t, film is a kind of lens in which to look at current events,” Moss said of the medium.

They emphasized the importance of showing the nuances of government secrecy in democracy, and went out of their way to avoid turning the issue into a black-and-white argument.

“We don’t mean to make a film that demonizes secrecy and extols openness,” Moss said. “We feel responsibility not just to show all the sides, but to engage with them.”

“Something about secrecy in a democracy strikes a melancholy note,” said Galison. But he stopped short of condemning the keeping of secrets, altogether.

“Secrecy seems to be the promise of our survival,” he said.

Nasser Zakariya, a student at the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences and a veteran of the filmmakers’ course, attended the screening and praised both the men and their class. “You don’t necessarily have to shout a thesis at someone,” he said. “That’s a huge advantage of film.”

“It’s a large departure from some of [Moss’] earlier works, but I think it’s a successful departure,” Zakariya continued. “The visual tropes they set up in this film are very good…I liked how they rendered secrecy visible.”

—Staff writer Erin F. Riley can be reached at eriley@fas.harvard.edu.