Seven years may have passed between Vernon, Florida (1981) and his next documentary, but Errol Morris didn’t let that time go to waste. Instead, he spent two and a half years investigating what would become The Thin Blue Line, a procedural that eventually exonerated an innocent man serving a life sentence for a crime he did not commit. Morris not only used that time to craft an excellent and vital film, but he also produced a documentary unlike anything else that preceded it.
Just as Vernon, Florida came about as a happy accident (Morris initially set out to make a documentary about insurance fraud), The Thin Blue Line also finds its genesis in another discarded idea. Morris went to Texas to make a documentary about Dr. James Grigson, a person featured, peripherally, in The Thin Blue Line. A forensic psychiatrist, Grigson earned the moniker “Dr. Death” from the press. In Texas, the death penalty can only happen when the jury believes the defendant is not only guilty, but will likely commit violent acts again. Whenever Grigson was called on to examine and testify, he invariably claimed that the defendant was a sociopath and would likely kill again. Eventually kicked out of both the American Psychiatric Association and the Texas Society of Psychiatric Physicians in the mid-‘90s, Grigson’s actions are a small, but imperative part of The Thin Blue Line.
While researching his movie on Grigson, Morris learned about Randall Dale Adams, a drifter imprisoned for murdering a police officer in Dallas in 1976. With no prior criminal record, Morris became suspicious of Adams’ sentence and decided to investigate. Using the skills he honed while working as a private detective, Morris threw himself into finding out the truth behind Adams’ case.
In his prior films, Morris already revolutionized the way we view a documentary. Neither his first film, Gates of Heaven, nor Vernon, Florida feature a narrative voiceover. There is no definitive message to either film, as Morris cannily lets the people who populate both movies do all of the talking and leaves it up to the audience to interpret the results. But The Thin Blue Line is a very different animal, set apart both from the director’s earlier work and other documentary filmmaking. Featuring a stirring Philip Glass score, reenacted crime scenes and even choice costume decisions, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences didn’t even consider it eligible for Best Documentary because of its “scripted content.” Meanwhile, the National Society of Film Critics called it the year’s best documentary and the British Film Institute ranked The Thin Blue Line fifth on its recently-released list of 50 Greatest Documentaries of All Time.
There is a line that connects the prior two films to this one. Morris is fascinated with human beings and memory. We hope that for a death sentence to be issued, the case is cut and dry. But with the fogginess of memory (not to mention the need to scapegoat), it is clear that Adams had been railroaded in the shooting of the police officer. Much like his earlier films, Morris allows his subjects to simply talk, letting the camera pick their individual quirks in storytelling and even giving them the space to backtrack and contradict themselves. A lot of the material that ends up in a Morris documentary would likely be found on the cutting room floor for most other films.
The Thin Blue Line mainly works because Morris is able to assemble many of the key players that helped put Adams in jail, from the lawyers to the police to the witnesses that likely perjured themselves in the process. At the heart of the story is Adams himself, dressed in white (the color of innocence), who is given the chance to tell his side of the story. More beaten down than angry, Adams calmly explains to the camera the events surrounding the policeman’s death while professing his innocence.
Morris also includes extensive interviews with David Harris (no relation to the author of this essay), the man who probably shot the policeman. Arrested for a different murder and dressed in red (the color of guilt), Harris more or less confesses to the crime by the end of the film. However, Harris (a man who likely is a sociopath) is less interested in clearing Adams for the crime than punishing him for a perceived slight, curious as to how one small event can wreak havoc in someone’s life.
The Thin Blue Line isn’t simply a talking heads interview. Morris adds recreated footage of the night in question, adding to the tension. The addition of Glass’ score blurs the line between documentary and film. According to Morris, he purposely included aspects of film noir, rejecting what had become the conventions of cinéma vérité, a movement he felt set back documentary filmmaking. The film is a story about a man whose life became a living hell by being in the wrong place at the wrong time, one of the tenets of noir storytelling.
The Thin Blue Line sifts through the ashes of history to get at the truth. That’s a theme inherent in all of Morris’ films: that even if memory is fallible—and the way we process and interpret it even more so—than by examining and looking back at some event over and over, from many different angles, the truth lies within. History may be imperfect and flawed, but the search for truth shouldn’t be.