“Former defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld wriggles out of straight answers on the Iraq war in Errol Morris’s new documentary, screening in Venice Wednesday. ‘The Unknown Known’ takes its title from a 2002 speech Rumsfeld gave to justify the invasion. Asked at the time whether Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction, he replied that there are ‘things we do not know we don’t know.’ In the film, Morris repeatedly attempts to quiz Rumsfeld on this and other decisions taken by a man accused of disastrous mismanagement of the war and condoning policies on interrogation which led to cases of extreme abuse of prisoners.”
