The best thing about Camp X-Ray is its almost palpable depiction of futility: Inside the featureless hallways of the prison at Guantanamo, guards make their constant rounds, peering through each cell-door window every few seconds, moving in circles around the rooms.
Soldiers compare their dismal work to their forefathers’ heroic duty in World War II, sardonically noting that the food given to their Muslim prisoners is better than the chow in the mess hall. But, as we learn early on, guards can’t refer to their prisoners as “prisoners” — that would make them subject to the statutes of the Geneva Convention. These are “detainees,” and they are never put on trial, and nothing ever changes, and the soldiers keep making their rounds.