Directed by Paul Greengrass
Starring: J.J. Johnson, Gary Commock, Polly Adams, Opal Alladin, Starla Benford, Trish Gates, Nancy McDoniel, David Alan Basche, Richard Bekins, Susan Blommaert
Rated R for language, and some intense sequences of terror and violence.
111 minutes
Released four years, seven months and seventeen days after the September 11 attacks of 2001, UNITED 93 was the first Hollywood studio film to give a narrative account of those events, courting controversy from the ignorant who perceived the film as exploitation, and those who were overwhelmed by the intensity and closeness of the events depicted. It was the first, and to date, it remains the best film based on or directly involving those events. It premiered at New York City's Tribeca Film Festival, and 10% of the opening weekend gross went to the Flight 93 National Memorial Fund. Prior to shooting, Academy Award-nominated director Paul Greengrass (fresh off THE BOURNE SUPREMACY) acquired the blessing of the immediate families of each victim in the 40 passengers and crew who lost their lives on Flight 93. Attention to detail was meticulous, collaborating with some of the victims' families, and following the available records as closely as possible (a transcript of the cockpit recording was made available after the film had wrapped, raising some doubts about the order of events).
On that morning when a passenger airliner crashed into the North Tower of the World Trade Center, followed by an airliner into the South Tower just seventeen minutes later, and a third airliner crashed into the Pentagon thirty-seven minutes after that, there was a fourth hijacked airliner that attained a status unique among the attacks. United Airlines Flight 93 from Newark, New Jersey to San Francisco, California began its journey from the Newark International Airport at 8:42 AM, getting a late start on the attackers' schedule as the flight was scheduled to take off at 8:00 AM. Four minutes after Flight 93 was in the air, Flight 11 was flown into the WTC North Tower, and Flight 175 had just been hijacked and was minutes away from hitting the South Tower. At 9:28 AM, four men began hijacking Flight 93, at which point passengers began calling their families and learned of the attacks on the World Trade Center which had already taken place, and they connected the dots. We have limited information about what happened aboard Flight 93 that morning, but it is clear that the collective thirty-three passengers and seven-person crew managed to fight back, forcing the hijackers to roll the plane and crashing in a field in Pennsylvania at 10:03 AM. We do not know the exact intended target of the Flight 93 hijackers; initial assessments believed it to be the White House, but later statements by alleged organizers of the attacks identified the U.S. Capitol as the intended target. The ultimate decision, between a set of options, was given to the hijackers' discretion. A confirmed 2,977 victims (and 19 hijackers) were killed in the September 11, 2001 attacks, but there's no way to know how many lives the the 40 victims aboard Flight 93 saved at the expense of their own.
Greengrass' directorial style is ideal for this kind of film, with a penchant for loose scripting and heavy improvisation, documentary-style filming and procedural structuring, all of which combines to create an intensely visceral experience that feels as authentic as any film could. There are no movie stars in UNITED 93, no distractions; we don't even know the names of most of the characters. The four hijackers are presented realistically, as human beings molded in their religious extremism, nervous but dedicated, with a skewed sense of right and wrong, rather than being cheap or simplified stereotypes. The passengers and crew are multifaceted, each as individuals who feel like real human beings, and when they unite in bravery in the face of their imminent mortality, it is awe-inspiring and devastating.
The world was not ready for UNITED 93 in 2006. Trailers for the film were pulled from some theaters' shows after receiving complaints from shocked audience members, and there were petitions to Universal (the film's distributor) to pull advertising if not the film entirely. An appeal was made to the MPAA ratings board after it earned an R rating, while the studio desired a PG-13 instead, but the rating remained unchanged as the film was deemed too intense for a PG-13 rating. It opened in second place at the box office, behind the crass family-comedy RV of all things, but it achieved a worldwide gross of $76.2 million against a $15 million budget, so the film was financially successful. It is still the lowest-grossing Hollywood film directed by Greengrass. As uncomfortable as the film made many people, it was undeniably an incredible achievement, appearing on over 40 major critics' "top ten" lists for 2006, more than any other film that year except for THE DEPARTED and THE QUEEN, and in eight number one spots, more than any other film that year. It was nominated for two Academy Awards, including Best Director and Best Film Editing (two of the most highly-regarded categories), as well as winning many awards from critics and film workers guilds.
Perhaps in the years ahead, UNITED 93 will eventually receive the status it deserves as a classic film about an united act of bravery in the face of bloodiest attack on American soil that we've ever known.
No comments:
Post a Comment