Unike Gavin Hood's Rendition, which addressed the same concerns but with a wider, multi-character perspective, Threapleton's film was always going to have the narrow focus of one man's experience. And, while the two films' respective producers engaged in "dialogue" to ensure they weren't doubling up on the portrayal of the torture elements involved, Threapleton was determined that water-boarding - a CIA favourite that involves holding a cloth over the victim's face and then pouring water over it to give the sensation of drowning - was vital to his story.
"It was always going to be paramount, " he says, "It's at the very heart of the public debate surrounding the legalities of extraordinary rendition and the way what America calls 'enhanced interrogation' crosses into full blown torture. We researched as much as possible how the CIA use specific techniques of psychological manipulation so that when we came to do the interrogation scenes there would be a real air of authenticity. For me it had to be as explicit and as unpleasant as possible."
The film's dramatic impetus was based on the case of Canadian computer specialist Maher Arar, arrested at John F. Kennedy Airport in September 2002 and taken to Syria, where he was imprisoned and tortured for a year. But although Amnesty put Threapleton in touch so he could gauge the accuracy of the character's emotional responses, he insists it was always intended as a fictional portrayal of the idea of extraordinary rendition.
"As far as we know there's not been a case of anyone being lifted from London's streets and put through something like this, but I do take the liberty of calling to question an establishment that is responsible for this man's fate but which presents a blank response when confronted with its machinations."
Armed with a 25 page treatment arc with fixed beginning and end and broad narrative strokes in-between, Threapleton then workshopped the story, getting his cast to improvise in true Mike Leigh tradition.
"We wanted the actors to understand their characters as fully as possible and I worked extensively with Omar to that end. The treatment we had allowed the actors to improvise their way through what was a very bleak landscape and it became very tense. I'd kept Andy away from Omar so as to make their relationship as spontaneous as possible on set and the interrogation sequences proved very interesting. You already had the inherent dramatic tension of the captive and the interrogator on opposite sides of the table and when you applied the rigours of the techniques we'd researched and allowed them to run with it, there were some very surprising results. The physical element provides a very strong sense of realism and the two of them found it extremely gruelling."
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