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United 93 - Paul Greengrass
Months before Oliver Stone releases his 9/11 film World Trade Center, Paul Greengrass, helmer of such thrillers like Bloody Sunday and The Bourne Supremacy released United 93, the director's take on the only hi-jacked plane that supposedly never reached its destination. If anything, Stone has every reason to give his finished product a final look before unleashing it to the world because Greengrass' film is very good, distinctly honest and objective in as much as it can be objective.
On September 11 of that fateful year, four commercial planes were hi-jacked. Two of the planes went straight through the twin towers of the World Trade Center, leading to its untimely collapse. One landed and hit one side of the United States' military center, the Pentagon. The last plane, United Airlines 93, landed somewhere in Pennsylvania. Just after the tragic events, rumors spread on why United 93 just went streaming down the middle of nowhere. Supposedly, the United States military, alarmed by the seemingly planned hi-jacks and attacks on centers of American power, shot down the plane to prevent it from reaching whatever target it's supposed to hit. In Greengrass' film, the reason for the failure of the terrorist's plan was due to the reactions of the plane's passengers.
The film is tightly woven, and paced in supposed real time. It starts out with the scene of the terrorists praying to Allah, and preparing for the day ahead. Calm and assured, Greengrass paces the introductory sequences in clockwork assuredness. The pilots arrive, along with the stewardesses, chatting away, and giving tangential clues as to who they are and whom they will leave behind. I acknowledge the fact that Greengrass never really gave us to chance to know these people. As far as he was concerned, his characters are merely passengers of an ill-fated flight. They might be husbands, wives, mothers, students, or children in their lives outside that plane, but Greengrass never really delves into such, giving us undivided focus on what is to happen. Greengrass segues his airplane scenes to the the FAA, then to the military center, then to the respective airports' air traffic controllers. This balanced attention to detail is exquisite and gives Greengrass an opportunity to tell his story in real time without boring his audience to death.
The visuals are almost documentary-like. Greengrass utilizes hand-held cameras and more often than not, appreciates imperfect visual impulses rather than pitch-perfect glossy cinematography to detail his story. The result is mixed. There's certainly confusion in the air, when the more action-filled scenes are plastered in hand-held, almost masturbatory camera movements. However, when the film centers in frenzied dialogue (which the film is mostly concerned with), the visual style is effective. It creates an atmosphere of uneasiness.
What I really liked about United 93 is the fact that it does not draw emotions from extraordinary acts of courage and heroism. The psychological impulses and reactions of the passengers and crew of the hi-jacked plane are results of fear, of anger, of attacked pride, rather than nationalism or that oft-repeated notion of American pride. Their retaliation is not a result of dreams of glory, or even survival, but of animalistic vengeance, or perverted purges of passion. As much as the film's topic is of political value, the film is very apolitical. There is not a notion of anti-American sentiment or pro-Bush activism. Greengrass tells the events as it is, and as how he perceives them to be. Whatever communications of unreadiness of the American government, or the dilly-dallying of the presidency in its inaction is a result of the factual circumstances rather than of directorial leaning. Even the trespassers, the terrorists, are presented in a light of objective air. In the film, they are merely extremist Muslims, rather than political activists. Sure, they are presented as villains but such cannot be denied as human impulse dictates that one rallies for the ones denied of their rights - and in this film's case, it is the passengers of United Airlines 93. ****1/2/***** |
| | Posted 7/6/2006 1:47 PM - 126 Views - 0 eProps - 0 comments
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