Terry Gross

Enter MeActor-director Kevin Costner won the Oscar for Dances With Wolves, but he made his first movie splash as a corpse in The Big Chill: He played the friend whose suicide brings a group of old friends together, but all of his speaking scenes were cut from the film, so all we see of Costner is a shot of his hand peeking out from beneath a sheet.

Costner went on to star in Field of Dreams, Tin Cup, Waterworld, Bull Durham and The Upside of Anger; in his latest film, Mr. Brooks, he plays a loving family man who's also a serial killer.

Director Brad Bird and actor Patton Oswalt talk about their film Ratatouille.

The new picture, from digital-animation powerhouse Pixar, opens nationwide tomorrow; it's a comedy about a foodie rat who becomes a chef in a top Paris kitchen.

Bird previously directed and wrote The Incredibles and The Iron Giant.

Oswalt, who provides the voice of the leading rat, Remy, is a writer and stand-up comedian. He's also something of a serious foodie himself — which is in part why Bird wanted him to play his furry hero.

Clive Stafford Smith is one of just a few people who've had independent access to the U.S. prison at Guantanamo Bay. He's a human rights lawyer representing dozens of the prisoners held there, and he says countless innocent men have been held at Gitmo for years with no meaningful review of the accusations against them. Many of them, he says, have suffered terrible abuse.

In Eight O'Clock Ferry to the Windward Side: Seeking Justice in Guantanamo Bay, Smith details the abuses and absurdities of life inside the legal black hole of the prison camp.

Earlier on today's Fresh Air, we heard from Clive Stafford Smith. He's a defense attorney who charges in a new book that numerous innocent men have been held at the U.S. prison in Guantanamo for years with no meaningful review of the accusations against them.

For a different perspective, we're speaking with Capt. Pat McCarthy, the U.S. government's lead counsel in Guantanamo.

James Weinstein, M.D., chairs Dartmouth College's orthopedic-surgery department; he's considered one of the nation's leading experts on low-back pain.

Weinstein says a multi-year study examining different treatments for lumbar disk herniation shows that surgery isn't necessarily a better choice than non-operative treatments. He says that there is little difference in outcomes, and he's an advocate of conservative, non-invasive treatment.

She works in a country where reporters have been harassed, deported, jailed, even tortured. She's subject to all these risks herself — but Peta Thornycroft surrendered her British citizenship and became a Zimbabwean so she could remain in the country and continue to report on the challenges it faces. She's one of the few independent journalists still working in Zimbabwe.

Journalist James Fallows, a 25-year veteran of The Atlantic Monthly, is living in China and writing about it. He joins Dave Davies to discuss his recent article "China Makes, The World Takes" — and the booming Chinese factories that are its subject.

Gone Baby Gone, a new film based on the Dennis Lehane novel, stars actor Casey Affleck as a blue-collar private investigator drawn into a child-abduction case. The film is directed by Affleck's movie-star brother, Ben Affleck.

Casey Affleck has also appeared in the American Pie films, Ocean's 11 and its sequels, and Good Will Hunting.

Always politically minded, chess master Garry Kasparov is now running for president of Russia. He's the leader of an opposition coalition known as The Other Russia. He's also published a new book, called How Life Imitates Chess: Making the Right Moves, from the Board to the Boardroom.