While it may not explain the mystery of faith-based evil, this anthology of interviews�with a biographer, a fellow student, a Saudi insider, a guerrilla-warrior comrade from Afghanistan, the British reporter (Robert Fisk) who interviewed him in Sudan, and three Arab journalists who�ve followed the Al Qaeda story from the start�at least allows us to form a picture that isn�t a cartoon. Again and again, producer Zvi Dor-Ner underlines Osama�s theocratic convictions, his hatred for the American presence in Saudi Arabia and the royal family who made that presence possible, the fact that he could have lived a comfortable, plutocratic life, and the unlikelihood of any end to this saga other than a bloodbath. The odd effect is to suggest a character in a contemporary thriller�plausible, unrepentant, hortatory, and banal.