History Film / Unthinkable

* BrokenAesop: The movie deliberately takes no stand and remains ambiguous as to whether H was right - the viewer is free to form their own opinion on the relationship of ethical and moral values and extreme situations and whether the suspension of said values is justified. Unfortunately, the extended version of the movie thoroughly undermines said premise in just forty or so extra seconds - [[spoiler: by showing, after the final scene where the children are led away by Brody, that the fourth bomb is indeed real. The screen fades to black as the timer reaches zero, so it is still somewhat ambiguous whether the bomb really explodes, but it seems to be strongly implied... thus pointing out that Younger indeed lied, and implicitly showing that TheExtremistWasRight after all - had H tortured Younger's children, the man would have likely broken and the attack would have been prevented.]]

* AMillionIsAStatistic: A homegrown terrorist and aspiring mass murderer has scattered several nuclear devices across the United States and rigged these to explode, which would kill millions of people. A TortureTechnician attempts to force the information out of him by [[NecessaryEvil any means necessary]], with the film questioning the validity of such. While this "dillemma" will seem downright farcical to most people, a better case is presented when the interrogators are considering torturing the man's two innocent children. Later on, the female FBI Agent who's taken the strongest stance against the interrogator's actions trusts the terrorist at his word and causes the deaths of 53 people. Despite this, she plays the trope horrifyingly straight when she openly voices her preference to let ''thousands'' of children all be killed to preserve the lives of his.

* PostNineElevenTerrorismMovie: The film focuses on the [[HeWhoFightsMonsters psychological toll that extreme interrogation techniques have on its practitioners]], and whether or not it being a part of their job makes them [[DesignatedHero "good" guys]] or not.

''Unthinkable'' is a 2010 thriller film starring Creator/SamuelLJackson, Creator/CarrieAnneMoss and Creator/MichaelSheen.

* FailedASpotCheck: H has to point out to the assembled experts that the precise descriptions of the bombs and the stolen nuclear material mean [[spoiler:he had enough ro make ''four bombs'', despite only admitting to three]].

* {{Fingore}}: H begins by cutting off the tip of the terror suspect's finger and it is later shown that he has pulled out all of his fingernails.

* AMillionIsAStatistic: The movie dwells on this with debates on whether it is morally justified to torture a known terrorist and aspiring mass murderer to death to extract information on the whereabouts of several nuclear devices that he scattered across the United States and rigged to detonate, which would kill millions of people. While this "dilemma" will seem downright farcical to most people, a better case is presented when the interrogators are considering torturing the man's two (innocent) children already already murdering his (innocent) wife and their mother. When the WideEyedIdealist character is already responsible for the deaths of 53 people by trusting the terrorist at his word, she plays the trope horrifyingly straight when she openly voices her preference to let ''thousands'' of children all be killed to preserve the lives of his.

* BrokenAesop: The movie deliberately takes no stand and remains ambiguous as to whether H was right - the viewer is free to form their own opinion on the relationship of ethical and moral values and extreme situations and whether the suspension of said values is justified. Unfortunately, the extended version of the movie thrashes said premise in just forty or so extra seconds - [[spoiler: by showing, after the final scene where the children are led away by Brody, that the fourth bomb is indeed real. The screen fades to black as the timer reaches zero, so it is still somewhat ambiguous whether the bomb really explodes, but it seems to be strongly implied...thus pointing out that Younger indeed lied, and implicitly showing that TheExtremistWasRight after all - had H tortured Younger's children, the man would have likely broken and the attack would have been prevented.]]

* WhamLine: [[spoiler:"Bring me the children."]]

* NeverMyFault: After Steven [[spoiler: kills 53 people with a bomb and it is firmly established the nuclear threat is real,]] he goes a fanatical rant which can be partially summarized as him blaming pretty much everyone in the room ''but'' himself.

* {{Hypocrite}}: Steven makes it all too clear is is totally willing to murder millions of people (including children) if he doesn’t get what he wants. [[spoiler: When his ''[[EvenEvilHasLovedOnes own]]'' children are in danger, (namely, put in the same room as [[TortureTechnician H]]) he gives in pretty quickly.]]

* BeingTorturedMakesYouEvil: When Agent Brody asks H's wife, Rina, how she can stand to live with and have a family with H considering how he is "not normal" and dangerous by any moral standards, she discloses a dark secret about her past. [[spoiler: She once had a family in Bosnia, but three men came to her home and raped her in front of all her family members. They then murdered all her family members with her young son being the last one killed. These men were her neighbors who she admitted were seen as "normal" and known by her personally before the incident]]. It's pretty clear the experience caused her to become indifferent/borderline sociopathic about what H does or what she does to others, only caring about her own family at this point. [[spoiler: What she didn't reveal, according to H, is that after the three men were captured by authorities, she killed their wives and their children in front of them and then she killed the men when US troops arrived]]. [[CaptainObvious She's as monstrous as H is if you can't see from reading this]].

* JackBauerInterrogationTechnique: "H", the [[DesignatedHero "hero"]] of the film, is an ex-Army interrogator who uses extreme methods to get a terrorist to talk, which go up to and include cutting off the man's fingers, electrocuting him, and [[spoiler:killing his family in front of his face.]] His methods end up being viewed as crossing the MoralEventHorizon for the counter-terrorism unit assisting him, causing them to run interference.

* MutilationInterrogation: Samuel L. Jackson plays an interrogator specialized in EnhancedInterrogationTechniques who is called in by his CIA handlers to torture the whereabouts of hidden nuclear bombs in the United States out of a muslim American terrorist. The ''first'' thing he does is to violently hack off his captive's thumb, prompting a WhatTheHellHero reaction from his colleagues. He later proceeds to do remove the nails from the rest of his fingers.

* TortureTechnician: H is an unscrupulous one, while also on military payroll.