United 93 Review

In 2006, when Universal Pictures announced it was releasing writer-director Paul Greengrass' United 93, there was a mixed reception. While some were anticipating the film, most thought that "five years on" was much too soon for Hollywood to bring the horrific events of September 11, 2001 from the pages of recent history to the silver screen.

Some people thought that the families and friends of the 40 passengers and crew who died aboard the only hijacked plane of four that didn't hit its intended target would be upset.  Others said they feared the film would distort the truth.  Still others said they weren't emotionally ready to watch a movie - no matter how well-intentioned it was - about the darkest day in recent American history.

United 93, of course, was not the first dramatization of the events aboard the West Coast-bound airliner which crashed in a field outside Shanksville, Pennsylvania as its passengers and surviving crew members fought to wrest control of the plane from four Al Qaeda terrorists.  Two made-for-TV movies (The Flight That Fought Back and Flight 93) aired in the months prior to United 93's premiere; it was, however, the first one made for world-wide theatrical release.

Truth be told, I did not want to go see United 93 in theaters three years ago; I still cringe when I see the now-indelible clips of the second hijacked plane hitting the unstruck South Tower when they show up on September 11-related documentaries.  I also lost my dad to a plane crash back in 1965, so sitting in a movie theater and watching a recreated real-life plane crash is not my idea of fun.

Nevertheless, spurred on by the amazing news that pollls now show that most Americans favor pulling out of Afghanistan because it's "not worth the cost in American lives," I bit the proverbial bullet and decided to buy United 93 on DVD. 

My reasoning went something like this: If people during World War II - the last war of necessity waged by the U.S. until September 11 - could go and watch John Ford's December 7th two years after Pearl Harbor, why can't I spare less than two hours of my life and remember why the war in Afghanistan started in the first place?

Still, it took me about a week after I received the DVD from Amazon to watch the extra features stuff first - a rarity for me - and another two days before I sat through the film itself.

Mohammed Atta: We have some planes...

United 93 begins, as it must, during the early morning hours of September 11, 2001.  The four Al Qaeda terrorists assigned to take over the plane are in their hotel rooms in Newark, New Jersey, and writer-director Greengrass spends some time showing us their quiet but intense preparation for the "jihad" operation.  It's quite frightening to see how quiet and pious the four young men are; they read from the Koran and go through Muslim rituals (bathing, shaving their bodies) that they believe are needed to enter Paradise later that day.

The movie then intercuts between various locations which range from the busy Newark International Airport terminal, Boston Air Traffic Control, New York ATC, the Federal Air Administration headquarters, and various military bases, showing us what the terrorists, the passengers, flight crew and the various government agencies do once the first signs of trouble appear.

Even though the viewer knows what's coming, Greengrass - who uses real civilian and military personnel who were on duty on that terrible September morning - nevertheless allows the real-time narrative build up its feeling of something bad is going to happen without making it look overly dramatized. 

Captain Jason Dahl: [looking at message on display screen] Two planes have crashed into the World Trade Center? We just flew out of Newark and the weather was beautiful!
First Officer LeRoy Homer: Must have been student pilots.

Part of the realism, of course, is due to the refusal of Greengrass to follow Hollywood conventions of focusing on either the hijackers or the obvious "hero" (Todd Beamer) whose last words - "Let's roll!" - were a rallying cry for the nation during the flag-waving days after 9-11.  Greengrass refuses to ID all the passengers who appear on-screen, which gives United 93 the same sense of "these guys are mostly strangers to each other" that one feels when taking a flight or riding a bus.

Another factor that makes United 93 feel urgently real is the casting. Not only did Greengrass convince such non-actors as FAA Administrator Ben Sliney and 1st Lt. Jeremy Powell (just to name two) to play themselves, but most of the professional actors are unknown "character" performers.  (Additionally, the United 93 crew is portrayed by real pilots and flight attendants.)

This helps the viewer to immerse him- or herself into the movie and not have the illusion of reality broken by seeing the presence of a big-name star ("Oh, that's Harrison Ford as Ben Sliney!") that pulls audiences into a more relaxed "It's just a movie..." mindset.

Finally, Greengrass unapologetically refuses to simplify things for the average person who doesn't have any idea what certain air traffic control terms mean and thus would be confused by them. Again, this is to show the viewer how the events unfolded and to evoke just how confusion, communications breakdowns and a sense of This can't be happening affected the government's initial response to the 9-11 hijackings.

My Viewpoint: Clearly, United 93 is not a 'let's watch this with the kids" type of movie. It is a fairly accurate depiction of a very tragic incident in which everything went wrong, not just for America but for the hijackers, too.  Not only did the 40 passengers and crew resist to the very end, but other factors derailed Al Qaeda's plans for United 93, which was supposed to hit the White House around the same time the other three planes hit their targets.

Though the whole movie is spine-chilling and incredibly intense, for me the toughest moment in United 93 comes while the plane is still at the gate in Newark.  The passengers - including the four terrorists - are aboard, the crew is getting things settled, and the access hatch closes. 

It's at this moment, when we see the latch mechanism moving inexorably to the LOCKED position, that I felt the worst anxiety.  It's a small detail, one that everyone of us who has boarded a plane on our way to somewhere else has probably never noticed.  But in this context, it's like a tomb being sealed, and only four of the passengers know it.

Todd Beamer: Are you guys ready? Let's roll! Come on, let's go.

What I like - if that is a proper term for this movie - is how Greengrass never panders to the audience by making certain scenes more action-movie like.  Even Todd Beamer's famous last words are delivered naturally and without bravado.  The people aboard the plane know what the hijackers' "brothers" did and that they probably won't survive, but even in the more speculative scenes, Greengrass doesn't turn United 93 into a civilian version of Air Force One.