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"The Fog of War" (2003) won the Academy Award for Best Documentary, and I can certainly see why. This is Errol Morris's film about the life and times of Robert S. McNamara, best known as the U.S. Secretary of Defense during the 1960s. Although I sometimes had to struggle to keep up with the nimble-minded 85-year-old McNamara, I found Morris's movie about him enthralling. While the documentary centers around McNamara talking, it seems to me Morris did a brilliant job of coming up with visual images to accompany what is being said.

Also, the somber and edgy music by Philip Glass underscores the gravity of the subject matter.

McNamara is a controversial figure in American history because he was Secretary of Defense during the early years of the Vietnam War, which was known in some 1960s circles as "McNamara's War." One of his critics called him an "IBM machine with legs," and many regarded him as a cold-blooded technocrat. In "The Fog of War" he acknowledges, "A lot of people think I'm a son of a b***h."

It appears to me Morris's approach to "The Fog of War" was basically to let McNamara present himself. What I like here is that it gives me a chance to partially get inside the former Secretary's head. On the other hand, the documentary provides little counterbalance to McNamara's views.

For me, one of the most fascinating and unexpected aspects of "The Fog of War" concerns McNamara's World War II service as an aide to the famously bellicose General Curtis LeMay. McNamara states he was part of the group recommending the strategy that led to firebombing 67 Japanese cities, burning to death a million civilians.

He seems to have some qualms about the morality of what he did, and he remarks that both he and LeMay might have been prosecuted as war criminals had the other side won.

In another part of the documentary, McNamara looks happy as he recalls becoming Secretary of Defense in 1961 under President John F. Kennedy. It was during JFK's second year in office that the Cuban Missile Crisis occurred, and McNamara gives lots of interesting insights into it, eventually making the disheartening assertion, "We lucked out. It was luck that prevented nuclear war." Kennedy's third year in office was cut short when he was assassinated, and McNamara becomes emotional as he speaks of walking in Arlington National Cemetery to choose the fallen President's final resting place.

I think the most significant part of ?The Fog of War? begins around the time of JFK?s death, when Lyndon B. Johnson became President. LBJ kept McNamara on, but the documentary makes the relationship between the new President and his Secretary of Defense look like a rocky one. When McNamara talks about his 1968 departure from the Johnson administration, he claims he didn?t know whether he quit or was fired. But he reports that the publisher of The Washington Post told him, ?Are you out of your mind? Of course you were fired.?

Although McNamara shows more candor than I expected in much of the documentary, I didn't find him entirely forthcoming about his role in the Vietnam War. Morris must have thought that, too, and although his voice isn't heard often during the film, as it winds down he puts two big questions to McNamara: (1) "After you left the Johnson administration, why didn't you speak out against the war?"; and (2) "Do you feel in any way responsible for the war?" McNamara refuses to address either question.

The full title of the documentary is "The Fog of War: Eleven Lessons From the Life of Robert S. McNamara," referring to 11 lessons inferred by filmmaker Morris. As a bonus material, the DVD presents in text form 10 lessons prepared by McNamara, the most thought-provoking of which to me is Lesson 8: "We should build a system of jurisprudence based on the International Court ? which would hold individuals responsible for crimes against humanity."

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