United 93

This is a hard film to sell.

You tell people that there is a film about 9/11 coming out, and they react like you might expect. They comment on it being too soon for such a film. They worry about cashing in on the event. They have concerns about it being a maudlin, heartstring-tugging, music-swelling sap-fest, over-dramatizing a day which needs none of it. Or maybe they worry the opposite--that it will turn into some jingoistic, overly patriotic, AMERICA--FUCK YEAH! kind of movie--a real barn burner for America.

And I worried about all those things, and the trailers for United 93 didn't really help matters. But I kept hearing about this film. I kept hearing how amazing it was, and how powerful an experience it truly was. So I decided to catch it before it left theaters.

Before the movie started, my friend Dietrich and I were joking around, commenting that we heard that the movie had a happy ending in which everyone gets away. The couple behind us were chit-chatting, and I was worried about having to tell them to shut up the whole time.

When the movie ended, a little over two hours later, no one moved as the credits started to roll. The girl behind us was sobbing uncontrollably. I had tear stains on my cheeks--a rare thing for a movie to do to me. So did Dietrich.

This film is perhaps the most powerful, emotional, draining experience I can remember having in theaters. I told my friend Adam that it came closest to comparing to watching Requiem for a Dream, but that you could walk away from, reminding yourself that, "You know, it's only a movie."

Not this.

My fears about the film were groundless. Paul Greengrass (who directed the also-powerful Bloody Sunday, which I commented on here) plays the film as if it were a documentary. There is almost no score, and what score there is is used sparingly, only accenting the movie, never dominating it. There are none of the movie cliches--the characters we meet and get to know, as if this were The Poseidon Adventure. We know as much about these people as we would if we were on that flight--a feeling the movie truly creates for you.

The movie focuses solely on either the air-traffic controllers or the flight itself. There are no other locations, no other characters. When we see people calling home, we have no idea who picks up, who they talk to, what is said. The moments are left imagined. There are no shots of funerals, of crying widows. It truly creates that day, once again--a day when we were all confused and had no idea what was going on.

The air-traffic controller scenes truly make this work. Many--at least half a dozen or more--of the controllers play themselves. I cannot imagine what this must have been like, but perhaps it was a way of closing that chapter, of trying to understand their role in that day. Maybe it was just a sense of dedication to the event. Whatever the reason, it adds to the realism, the naturalistic feel of the film.

Greengrass also worked hard to insure the realism of the plane sequences. Apparently, he talked with the families, learning about the victims--what they were wearing, what kind of candy they may have had. They become true people, even though we don't entirely get to know them.

So do--and this is the more surprising, and more honorable aspect of the film--the terrorists. It would have been easy to make them into villains. To de-humanize them, make them the calm killing machines of so many bad spy movies. They are not. They are men--just as scared as the passengers. The movie plays their faith correctly--they are not Muslims who are attacking Americans. They are simply men and hijackers first, Muslims last. The film creates their humanity well, only adding to the overall sense of tragedy of the film.

As for the actions we all know took place on the flight? Handled perfectly. I was concerned that the famous "let's roll" line would be some sort of action catchphrase; it's tossed away so perfectly as to almost be forgotten. The scene plays not as some American stand against tyranny. There are no speeches, no dramatic music. There are only scared people attempting to fight back. The event is changed from some sort of national symbol to a human conflict.

That, to me, is the film's greatest achievement. It does not over-dramatize; it does not flag-wave; it does not play politics. It just shows. It strips 9/11 of all the political baggage and symbolism that has been foisted upon it, and simply shows, faithfully, what the day was like.

It is not a film for all tastes. It is a powerful film, and a devastating one. It is the first film I have seen that truly made me remember what that day was like, how affecting it was. It is a heartbreaking film--not because of Hollywood theatrics, but because it reminds us of what really happened. Not the blow to freedom. Not the strike against our country. Just the loss of human lives who never asked to be a political symbol.

I don't know that I'm doing a very good job reviewing this film, much less persuading you to go see it. All I can tell you is that the film does exactly what it should--it remembers the victims. Not the event. Not the aftermath. Not the political wrangling. Not who was to blame. It admires the heroes who could only watch and react, and it mourns the passengers who lost their lives. It evokes fear, anxiety, sadness, grief, anger, frustration, horror--there is not a frame of the film that is not emotional in some way. It is a rare and devastating, disturbing experience, but it is no less than the event deserves.