United 93 is a stellar film-making achievement

Rating: 10/10 (5 June 2006)

Director Paul Greengrass' "United 93" is a magnificent film, both in it's artistic accomplishment, and it's success in creating an emotional experience that should quell critics who believe the story's telling is coming "too soon". It takes a filmmaker of brazen courage and extraordinary skill to tell the story of the passengers, terrorists and air-traffic and military personnel that held us transfixed on September 11, 2001, given how socially relevant the events of that day still are in our daily lives. Greengrass has crafted a film that honors the real-life people of 9/11 without an ounce of exploitation. I am a huge fan of an earlier film of Greengrass's called "Bloody Sunday", which depicted the civil rights march massacre in Ireland that bolstered the IRA's political presence. It was called "documentary-style" film-making by many critics, with a roving camera, presumably never weighed down by a tripod, wonderfully realistic acting, and a script with overlapping dialogue that never once rang false. All of these aspects are used to eerie effect in "United 93", as the film never condescends to present you with pedestrian movie gimmicks to force a feeling on you. Greengrass is much smarter, as his cinema verite style percolates in the extreme ordinariness of the first few hours of that fateful day. Pilots arrive at the terminal, chatting unimportant banter, passengers check phone messages, the FAA operations manager trudges into his first day on the job. The inevitability of our knowledge of the fate of these people simmers underneath it all. Greengrass' fly-on-the-wall style doesn't announce "Great moment of the film coming!" or pander to labeling the passengers from Standard Disaster Film Catalogue #1, enabling unbelievability with witty dialogue. The material demanded more. "United 93" achieves much more by immersing you in the chaos and confusion in the flight towers and military bases of the east coast, and strapping you in as a passenger of the doomed flight. Much has been made of the fact that the film boasts no stars. This is a great asset, as no baggage marred my ability to get to know the characters just as they got to know each other. In fact, many of the roles in the film are played by the people who experienced 9/11 firsthand, the boldest performance coming from Ben Sliney, who plays himself as the FAA operations manager, whose day slips into turmoil as he's constantly fed misinformation about hijacked planes, and underserved by a military presence. Sliney also served as a consultant to the film to help Greengrass re-create the order of the day most accurately. And as I watched hundreds and hundreds of shocked and frantic FAA controllers and military personnel scramble to prevent further harm to the country and await chain of command orders from the highest levels of government, I once again hope George W. Bush really enjoyed "My Pet Goat". Military response orders arrived from the Executive branch well after the fourth and final plane crashed in Pennsylvania. The film-making is so good, I almost expected a different outcome, I was so emotionally invested. After viewing the film, I was visibly shaking. It prompted a 90 minute conversation with my friend Kevin about religion and politics and reawakened in me an immediacy to be involved in the world view. Normally, when I write a review, I just say whether I liked a movie or not, but with "United 93", I am highly, highly recommending you SEE IT. This is easily the year's best film and one of the best I've seen in a long time. It's an important reminder of what happened that day, so when you see a "We Will Never Forget" sign, you can further understand. This film is a noble reminder that the greatest, most honest and most successful retaliation against terrorism since 9/11, happened immediately.