An important film that is pretty essential viewing.

Rating: 8/10 (8 November 2006)

After five years, the events of September the 11th are given the narrative touch and are transformed into a big budget, dramatic silver screen production from 'The Bourne Supremacy' director, Paul Greengrass; and it bodes well.
Throughout the years, history has been plagued with humane tragedies such as wars, famines and other such events involving human misery. What United 93 does is take an event that everybody, and I mean everybody, can relate to in their own way and transforms it into something that everybody can experience. Everybody remembers where they were and what they were doing on 9/11 and it's because the events portrayed in the film happened not so long ago, that all the audiences can experience the events unfolding within this two hour or so story before our eyes.
It's not film directors' fault that five years after the Holocaust was discovered to have happened; nobody made 'Schindler's List' but we should be honoured that we have been blessed with the fact that this one event that spawned a new world can be exploited on a medium we can all relate to: film, so soon after it happened.
United 93 takes on a documentary style which is as clear as day to anybody and we're definitely given the illusion through the camera work and editing that we're meant to actually be there in fact this was confirmed to me about half an hour later during the film when the camera gives a 'second glance' point of view shot/look at the radar when a plane merely disappeared from the screen.
What's also odd, but works in juxtaposition is the fact that we already know the outcome of the film. Wanting the protagonists to win and willing them on is absolutely futile as anybody who's either got half a brain cell or is more than five years old knows what's going to happen  it's why recent events that have dominated the news have done for the past few years. Despite this, the tension is still built up very cleverly through means of confusion and (what I presume to be) actual 9/11 news footage, keeping you poised on an absolute cliff hanger every time a new revelation occurs: 'what will happen now? What will they do?' you ask yourself, and you do genuinely care.
You might have already read or heard, but the final twenty minutes is absolutely spellbinding. I cannot praise it enough. It's like seeing slaves rise up against their oppressors or the long suffering victims lash out at their captors. In this instance, Arabs whom have struck fear into the innocent passengers on board are forced to give a last stand they didn't plan on doing and you just can't take your eyes from the screen. If the phone rings, you'll ignore it. It's that addictive.
Just as 'Schindler's List' was to the Holocaust, United 93 exploits a tragic event and the harrowing circumstances surrounding it into the medium of film for all to experience.