Something We Didn't Need

Rating: 1/10 (5 December 2006)

Is it even possible, after the suffering, relentless media coverage and two ensuing wars to take a bit of distance and consider 9/11 without all of its symbolisms? If we do, we have a sequence of events. The hijack. the crash. The collapse. the grief... We can try to look at events in a broader context, what triggered them, but then things get politicized at an alarming speed.
On 9/11, about 3000 innocent people died. This is a tragedy. as a statistic it pales in comparison to many places on this planet on any given day, yet our media amplified it and created a legend out of it. CNN, FOX and company have milked all the melodrama out of this human tragedy, and now in 2006 we have 2 films to commemorate it. That raises an important question: do these filmmakers think us so stupid as to need a reminder so soon? The only way to make this worthwhile is if the film seeks to understand these events.
Paul Greengrass's "United 93" offered a clinical observation of the hijacking and its emotionless precision made for more effective cinema, delivering raw, humbling reality when television had drowned us in melodrama, hyperbole and crassness. He gave 9/11 a sense of reality and a humanity which it had lost.
Oliver Stone, unfortunately, goes to the other extreme. His tale of two firefighters trapped under the debris may be based on reality, it never feels real. Going for a more austere style than he is used to, Stone inter-cuts the plight of these men with the anguish of their wives. It is an attempt to pay tribute, but, given the massive significance of the surrounding events, you can't shake the nasty feeling that said tragedy is being exploited to wring more tears out of you.
Stone's worst traits come out in the form of forced foreshadowing and symbolism, particularly an oft-mocked instance where Jesus brings water to a dehydrated fireman. Coming from the man who gave us JFK, Nixon and Bon on the Fourth of July, this is not just disappointing, but downright baffling: given how politically-charged this tragedy was, one might have expected Stone to question the media-version of events, tying American imperialism and the enemy's religious fanaticism to attacks on home soil and the resulting suffering of the innocent... But there's never even a hint of such thought. All we get is more salt in a barely cauterized wound.
The symbolic significance of 9/11 crushes the film's characters and story, dooming it to only arouse emotion in those who have lost loved ones, or by playing on the national feeling associated with the event. Neither of these qualifies World Trade Center as a good film.
This offensive garbage is everything we didn't need or want from a 9/11-inspired film.