The film usually induces prisoners to talk after 10 or 12 minutes. “They usually crack during the scenes in which Mariah Carey plays herself as a teenager,” says one source familiar with the CIA interrogations.
A spokesman for Amnesty International, the human-rights group, blasted the CIA for forcing captured Al Qaeda fighters to watch the excruciating film. “If a nation condones the institutionalized use of Mariah Carey films during interrogations, it comes perilously close to condoning torture,” says the spokesman.
In Washington, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld acknowledged that the CIA had been showing “Glitter” to Al Qaeda prisoners, but offered no apology for the controversial practice.
“There are things one does in times of war that one would not do in times of peace,” Rumsfeld said. “Making people watch a movie with Mariah Carey in it is one of those things.”
Carey could not be reached for comment about the CIA’s use of “Glitter,” but released a statement indicating that she was happy that the film had finally found an audience.
