Review of United 93
I saw United 93 a couple of times in the theatre, and I just finished watching the DVD – let me just say that it is a masterpiece, perfectly crafted.
Many directors would have utterly ruined this subject, but this film is pure genius in its simplicity. This is not to say that it is simple, rather the opposite. It has been refined; pared down to perfection through what must have been an extremely disciplined process.
If you are hesitant to see the movie because you might have a breakdown, don’t worry. It’s no more intense than Braveheart, for example, and actually much less intense than The Passion of the Christ, in my opinion. I cry pretty much anytime something reminds me of September 11th, and I was alright. Do make sure to take your blood pressure medication, and make sure that your pacemaker’s battery is good, though, since there are re-creations of some gut-wrenching moments from that day. The director is very careful, though, not to give you too much in any one dose, and he brings you back from the edge before you go over. In a sense, he holds your hand during the rough stuff.
United 93 is art at its highest level. By re-living that day, I have been able to make sense of a lot of things that I had forgotten, that had been muddled up over the last 5 years. It brings your thoughts and feeling back to the table, allowing you to sort them out with a crisp perspective. This film brought all my feelings, all the things I’ve learned since then, into crystal-clarity. Art is at its best when it makes sense of things, and this movie does that, allowing you to make discoveries with just a little nudge from the director.
I think it is every citizen’s civic duty to see this film. Sadly, the theatre I was in was only half-full, and that is being optimistic. While that’s more than I thought might be there, it probably should have been sold out.
WARNING: many spoilers follow!First off, the film reminds me a great deal of Tora! Tora! Tora!, as it probably should, since Pearl Harbor and September 11th share similarities.
The story is told with no dramatic effect other what actually happened. There is very little music, and we’re not given the usual “let’s meet these characters and get to know them” crap that you usually see in disaster movies. It starts out with the hijackers praying and follows the events in real time from that point.
Since flight 93 was the last plane down, you get the entire morning’s events as they happened, including a scene re-creating the second plane crashing into the tower. Actual footage is used frequently, but there are a few special effects that are extremely well-placed. They don’t seem like effects, really; for example, the Twin Towers themselves had to be digitally re-created, because they aren’t there anymore. Likewise, the shot of the second plane contains real footage, but we watch air traffic controllers pan the sky, following the plane glide in from across the river. They knew it was coming and were looking for it.
The movie stays intimate, but never cheesy, and you are like a quiet observer, watching the events in the same room as the characters. In some scenes, I almost felt like I should say something, forgetting that it’s a movie. Generally speaking, the characters say and do everything you want them to. They act like real people, and in a lot of cases, the roles were played by the actual people involved. Still, even though I knew the events were real, and what would happen, I kept waiting for a better ending. By the time the ending comes, you’re satisfied that everybody did the best they could do, and there’s something comforting in that.
The movie actually pissed me off more than it upset me. Yes, there was some re-living, some flashbacks, and I found my heart racing at moments, gripping my chair, body tensed, but as the film went on, I just got angry. Mostly I was angry at the military, as they bungled everything and couldn’t stop the second or third planes. The people performed their duties well, it was just that the systems in place prevented action. For example, nobody at the FAA could get in touch with the military, and vice versa. The military couldn’t get a hold of the president. I was glad to see though, that certain people made gutsy calls when they had to. One Air Force guy cuts through some red tape when he couldn’t get clearance to put planes over Manhattan. “Screw the FAA, get those planes scrambled!” in another moment, the head FAA guy orders the shutdown of the nation’s air systems. I wish more of our leaders had that kind of nerve.
We take comfort in knowing that the our government and our military have us protected, but when you see the events portrayed in this film, and in the way they were shown, you realize that these systems all break down in a real crisis. That’s the most disturbing thing about the attacks, and I didn’t realize that until I saw this movie. As I was driving home, it just hit me. Before 9/11, I was living in a state of naiveté, thinking our powerful military could protect us, that the government was better at organizing things than we are. I guess the whole country was in that state.
Watching this movie, you realize that the government is just like you and me–no wiser, no better. NORAD is good at spotting ICBMs and Russian Bombers, but they suck at protecting against commercial airliners. More than anything, I was angry at the lack of organization. In brief, our military failed us that day–not the individuals–but the whole structure of it. We were caught with our pants down. Still, I suppose that armies can only ever prepare for the last war, never the next war. That’s the most disturbing part of this movie, and I think that’s the key to why we were all so upset by the attacks. We trusted that our government had us covered, but they didn’t. That realization scares the hell out of me, and I think that’s the legacy of September 11th.
As an aside, you do get to see the passengers kick the shit out of one of the hijackers. There’s some pleasure in that, and while that part of the film is mostly made up from imagination, it seems real enough. While the movie never says it, the first guy in line to storm the hijackers seems like he’s had some hand-to-hand training. He delivers some nice knee-to-pelvis action that can only come from practice. While planning, he talks about breaking the guys arm like he knows what he’s talking about. You would probably have somebody like that in a group of people that large. Again, the director shows great discipline in not over-doing it. The whole scene where the passengers plan their attack seemed very real to me. It was just like I would imagine it.
More than anything else, this movie has reminded me that we really haven’t done anything to strike back at our attackers.
Sure, we bombed the hell out of Afghanistan, and we took out Saddam Hussein, but al qaida is still out there, making videos and gathering more recruits because our leaders lack the courage to do what must be done. Osama bin Laden is right, frankly. The US doesn’t have the guts to fight back. At least, not our leaders. They won’t go into Pakistan or Saudi Arabia for fear of political repercussions. In many respects, our reaction to September 11th is just the same as our reaction to the attack on the USS Cole, or the reaction to the Khobar Towers bombing, or the bombing of the Marine barracks in Beirut. Our reaction to all of these? nothing.
In 1941, the solution was simple: invade Japan and take it over. Our solution should be just that simple: invade Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, et al and take them over. If we had nukes in 1941, you’d bet your ass we would have annihilated Japan. Why won’t we do that today? What good is the most powerful military in the history of the world if we are afraid to use it? The Sleeping Giant is fat and lazy, too busy playing video games and buying junk he doesn’t need, all while thinking deep thoughts about fairness and tolerance, planted by communists 70 years ago.
To bring up questions like this, to give insight and clarity of purpose is art at its highest level, and I think it is every citizen’s civic duty to see this film. I’m not sure about kids, though. It’s not very graphic, it’s just that I don’t think they’d get it, nor would they have the attention span. Like having high school kids read 1984 or certain poetry and have it sail right on past their heads, it might be better to have them wait until they understand the material, as opposed to having them think 15 years later that, “hey, I saw that movie, it didn’t do anything for me.” Put another way, a child’s mind might file that information under “ignore” or “scary” and it would stay there through adulthood. The real meaning would be lost forever.