Friday, April 28, 2006
United 93 – A Must See – The Roving Theologians Review
Well, I went and saw the film. And, I think it is one of the best films of its type I have seen. It has the feel of both a documentary and of
a Greek tragedy, with impending doom only awaiting different choices and differnet actions. If only…
Let me set the stage…
I got to the theater a little late, and after getting my ticket (somehow it seems trite to talk about the ticket kiosk issues, not accepting my credit card, but…well, it made me later), grabbed a bag of popcorn (its horrible on my stomach but I had a feeling I would need it to get through the film), and headed to Theater 11. Sat down in the front row, as the previews were rolling.
Now it was an 11am showing, so it was not packed. Of course, when Lord of the Rings came out, the 11am showing was to the gills. Lets be honest, people seeing this film are not “excited,” they are curious and perhaps respectful.
The previews seemed a bit hackneyed as well. I seem to remember seeing Schindler’s List and they didn’t show any trailers. Maybe that is selective memory.
The film starts. And you the hear prayer to Allah in Arabic. The film begins with the terrorists in their hotel room. Let me say right off the bat, the portrayal by the four actors playing the terrorists was outstanding, especially the lead terrorist. One did not see any wild-eyed lunacy, as we have seen in recent days from Zacarias Moussaoui. Instead we saw men who were dedicated to their cause, wicked as it was and is. It is a good reminder of what Richard Miniter tells us in Disinformation. We know that terrorists are not poor and uneducated, but come by and large from educated and middle class settings. So, the portrayal of the terrorists was accurate and very respectful of the truth behind the men.
Throughout the whole film you have this horrible sense of impending doom, and of missed chances. If only the folks at airport screening had caught the men as they came through the security gates (by the way, I do not feel any safer with the TSA screening than with what was in pace before 9-11). If only the FAA had grounded all New York area flights the second they heard of the first hijacking. If only the pilots had bolted the door and refused to allow entry when they got the message over their system. If only…
When the 9-11 Commission hearing were going on, I really thought the approach was good but the publicity was wrong. We should have had a nonpartisan review of went wrong on September 11th, maybe by an outside agency. The fact is that we needed to learn what mistakes were made. But the thing about tragedies is, there are always, “if only” items that we can point back to and wish hadn’t of happened. We need to learn from them, but we also need to remember that human beings and the government we create are finite and flawed. There is no perfect system.
I listened to many people saying, “The government should have known that, or done that.” Great, but unless we are willing to live with no freedoms and no income, the government cannot do the kind of things that would stop all (100%) of terrorist attacks. And then, well why bother living.
Mark Steyn, the fantastic columnist to the world (http://www.steynonline.com) made a great point about United 93. Their government and all the bureaucracy failed them. But these “Office Park” Americans took measures into their own hands, with fear and trembling, and would not go quietly into the good night. That is what the film shows wonderfully.
The flight begins and all is normal. You have probably had the same experience those passengers had that morning – being stuck on the tarmac waiting for your flight to take off. One of things that struck me is that these 40 peoples had to endure the good old fashion bad travel day before they met their doom in that Pennsylvania field. There is something so ordinary about the beginning of the film. That is why it is so powerful. Watching that flight up to the moment of the terrorist take over, I saw scenes reminiscent of my travel experiences. That is both what is so frightening and so reassuring in the way that the film was shot. Terrorism thrives on taking the everyday normal experiences and destroying them with carnage and hate.
As some readers of this site may well know, I was supposed to be on the London Underground 7-7-05 going on the very line where dozens were killed and wounded at the exact time of the bomb. I was sick that morning and did not make my conference. I have ridden the Underground countless times, both before 7-7 and after, and it is a reminder that we never know what awaits us out our doors. That is what is so great about United 93, they capture that “normalcy with doom” that many human beings experience before the blast goes off on the bus in Tel Aviv, the roadside checkpoint in Baghdad, the shopping mall in Manchester or the village courthouse in Columbo.
And yet, 99.9999% of the time, nothing had does happen. There is a great scene in the movie where they think a Delta flight has been hijacked. It wasn’t (thankfully), but it reminds us that 9-11-01 there were thousands of passengers who experienced nothing more horrible than having their flights grounded in Wichita. And, since 9-11, millions of airplane passengers have had eventless trips, across America and the world. Their silent acts of bravery in some way is a testimony to the United 93 passengers. We will not be silenced, we will not give in to fear.
Another great piece of filming is the walk from the airport parking lot to the terminal with the terrorists. We see women in posters (scantily clad), we see people on their cell phones, women dressed for business and for comfort, and it speaks to so much of what the Islamicists hate about our country. Now, lets be clear, I share a lot of the anger towards the over-sexualization that occurs in our culture. I find it demeaning of women and dehumanizing in general. But the way the film was shot it captured the America that the terrorist believed made us worthy of being attacked. The difference between me and those men on 9-11 is that I understand that one cannot enforce a particular set of morality without destroying the freedom that makes it safe for me to practice my Christian faith. Those men saw only evil, whereas I see freedom turned towards evil ends. The makes of United 93 did a fantastic job of communicating that reality.
What I really appreciated about the film was the capturing of events outside of United 93. It showed the great confusion that all of us, especially for the government officials (FAA, military, government) experienced that day. It is easy to look back and say, “We should have done this” or “We should have done that,” but at the beginning of events, we didn’t know so much that we know today – that it was American Airlines Flight 11 that hit the WTC, that it wasn’t a small plane, that the reason the first two flights went dead wasn’t because of malfunction but because the pilots were no longer in charge of the planes. That is what makes the film so intense, you are thrown back into the confusion that hit us all on that morning.
As I mentioned in an earlier post, my first response to the WTC crash was, “What a bad pilot.” Who knew. Then when the Pentagon was hit, we first heard it was a helicopter crash. Okay, could be bad coincidence. My wife called me as I was on the way home to be with her and our first child that another plane had hit the North Tower, when in fact it was the Tower collapsing. The confusion I felt that morning came back to me in spades in the movie.
To say United 93 was intense is to state the obvious. I wasn’t aware my new daughter was crying for a period of time, the sounds, sites and action on screen had paralyzed me. I didn’t eat my popcorn (I never leave half a bag at the end of the film). My carrots (my favorite movie food) were untouched. The film so grips you and draws you in that you cannot take your eyes off of it.
The acting is very very good. It is indeed nice that you have no idea who is the start of the film (okay, the lead hijacker is, lets be honest). All the actors did a fantastic job. The head of the FAA in their D.C. operations center was outstanding (I understand he is the real deal – someone should sign him up now). The cinematography is outstanding. No use of gimmicks, just a solid job of focusing and widening throughout. The music…was their any? That is the best score to a movie, one that seamless moves with the film.
And the ending was outstanding. The fade to black and the detailing of the fact that no military planes were even near when they hit that field (Sorry conspiracy theorists). A nice detailing of the meaning of the actions of those of those passengers and crew that day. They saved the Capitol building, which is really important not just as symbol of American government. Most people are unaware that the Capital Dome was being renovated at the time Fort Sumter was attacked in 1861. Lincoln had the work continue, “As a sign that the Republic will continue.” The bronze Liberty that sits atop the capital dome was placed there in time for his magnificent Second Inaugural in 1865. Of all the attacks that were made that day, there is something deeply symbolic about the fact that this one, alone among the four, failed.
I am deeply grateful to have seen this film today. Some say, “Its too soon.” I think that is a sign of the state of our nation in 2006. During WWII films were being made about battles and events that had happened during the war. No one said, “Too soon,” because they understood that stories of courage and of fighting back are never too soon, they can only come too late.
As a Christian theologian I often get asked if I am a pacifist. My answer is odd, “I am a near pacifist.” Which means that I hate war almost as much as anything else. But I hate injustice more than war, and understand that the call of justice and of freeing people from oppression sometimes means that we must do battle and kill. It’s a realization that we live in a fallen world, that there are no “perfect options” in a world where sin still attempts to exert power. Since 9-11 we have given a new hope of freedom to 50 million men and women. The outcomes have not been all we had hoped (the recent potential death of a Muslim apostate in Afghanistan being a more destructive example than the presence of terrorism in Iraq, at least for the future of things). But, we cannot ever hope to see injustice overturned if we are not willing to stand up and defend others. That is what the passengers of United 93 did – in fear, terror, and anxiety – they defended their own lives and those of their fellow passengers.
