WORLD TRADE CENTER

US, 2006, 130 minutes, Colour.
Nicolas Cage, Michael Pena, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Maria Bello, Stephen Dorff, Jay Hernandez, Michael Shannon.
Directed by Oliver Stone.

This is a solid piece of drama, geared completely for its American audience with the memories and griefs of September 11th 2001. It is a tribute to the police and the firefighters personnel who went to the Center and into the towers to rescue people and who lost their lives – hundreds of them.

That, perhaps, is the difficulty for audiences around the world. It is patriotic in the best sense. But, it also has its moments of jingoism, which tend to put non-Americans on alert or even to make them hostile. It might be best to note this early in the review and then go on to praise what is good.

Speaking personally, the most difficulty I had was with the character of the marine who comes to help in the rescue on the afternoon of the 11th. He is played by Michael Shannon (who was even more frighteningly paranoid in William Friedkin’s Bug). His severe face and the intense glint in his eyes are truly alarming. When he hears the news, his stone-faced determination takes him to his pastor for advice as to how he should help. It is a religious mission in the crusading sense. Donning his uniform, he travels to New York and is able to enter the site and does fine work in the rescue. A post-script notes that he fought in Iraq later. One could not imagine him doing otherwise.

That is the scary part of the screenplay.

However, the re-creation of the planes hitting the towers, their collapse and the killing and trapping of police officers is also truly frightening. The collapse has been re-created in great detail. The audience is there – and probably wondering how we would have managed in such a situation, trapped, injured and in pain, dehydrated, alone, not knowing what had really happened or what was happening, striving to ward off sleep and unconsciousness. These aspects of the film are excellently done.

Many of us have our memories of September 11th, 2001, where we were when we heard and saw the news. It started as a perfectly ordinary day. And that is how the film starts, a well-paced crescendo of police and workers with their early rising, leaving families, travelling into New York City, the increasing numbers of drivers, train commuters, people chatting, reading, getting the paper, something to eat. At the Port Authority precinct, police get their roster for the day. Then come the shudders, the shock, the reports – and the police go into action.

This film focuses on a small group and then on two of the survivors who spent so many hours trapped beneath the rubble. They are played by Nicolas Cage and Michael Pena. Their scenes together, trying to support and encourage each other, are very effective.

In a popular film like this, it is necessary to fill in the characters’ backgrounds, show us some flashbacks of their lives, their families, as well as the anguish of uncertainty and waiting that they endure. While this is necessary and director and cast do their best, these sections look rather more routine, perhaps too familiar to audiences from too many disaster movies. The two wives are played well by Maria Bello and Maggie Gyllenhaal. We had to see these family reactions and, while they give some kind of audience relief for the tension, they also tend to take away from the scenes with the trapped men.

This is Oliver Stone’s most objective film. No conspiracies like JFK, no histrionics like Nixon, no sensationalism like Natural Born Killers. Rather, this is a tribute film, an acknowledgement of heroism and humanity that most audiences can appreciate.

1.The impact of the film? For Americans, New Yorkers? Non-Americans? The impact of the war on terrorism? President Bush’s policies? The war in Iraq? The war in Lebanon? The five years later – memoir, tribute? The re-creation of the scene, the testimony of witnesses, the reality of the experience of the police, a film for healing?

2.The factual aspects of the film, the modest focus? Two families? By implication for the rest of the police – especially for the many police and fire crews who died?

3.The focus, the two families, symbolic, tribute?

4.The reconstruction of the two towers, the planes crashing into them, the aftermath, the crashing of the buildings? Ground Zero? The New York locations, Port Authority, the police precincts, the streets? The homes in New York State, New Jersey? The ordinariness?

5.The opening of the film: September 11, 2001, the ordinary day, the police getting up in the morning, at home, breakfast, children? Going to work, driving, the music? The trains and the commuters? The gradual dawn? The city filling up? People going about their ordinary business? A normal day?

6.The details of the ordinary day, especially for the police, at the precinct, camaraderie, arriving and chatter, getting ready for work, job allotment? The squad itself? Their volunteering for particular duties at the World Trade Centre?

7.The work at the World Trade Centre, the need for equipment, their getting it, the men volunteering, the collapses and the effect, John and his urging them to go to the lift well, the collapse, their being buried? Chris, his volunteering, friends with the others, his death? Dom, trapped, dying and speaking? The film having built up his character? His gun, ready to die? His sitting dead – as if in vigil? John and Willi, the collapse? Deep down, the heavy concrete? The pain?

8.The hours passing, the audience getting to understand their characters better? Their talking, sharing, encouraging each other? The nature of the pain, their talking about it? Willi and his memories of GI Jane and the statement about pain? Knowing that you were alive if you were in pain? The theme from Starsky and Hutch? Urging each other not to sleep? The pipe, giving Willi some moisture, the possibility of banging it? Their dozing as the hours went by?

9.Their imaginations while they were trapped, memories of their families? Willi, Alison, the family, the extended family? Wanting the name Olivia for the next child? John, remembering Donna, the details of work at home? Their love for each other – the boys, the ordinariness of life? The background of the attack on the World Trade Centre in the 90s and his heroism?

10.Alison, strong woman in herself, pregnant, the family, at home, everybody gathering, her daughter Bianca, giving her to the neighbours? Her wanting to get out of the house, going to the supermarket? Realising they didn’t have a phone? Alison’s own family, support? Willi’s family, his mother? Their prayer?

11.Donna, her anxiety, John’s brother coming, the kids, J.J. and his moods, blaming his mother? The family gathering? Waiting for the phone? Memories?

12.Carson, his appearance, severe, patriotic? The marine? Discussing with his pastor? Deciding to go to New York? The marine, the gung-ho attitudes, going to the site, calling out, hearing the tapping, finding Willi? His heroism?

13.The scene in Wisconsin, the volunteers, the condemnation of the bombers?

14.Strauss, his skills, the rescue, his having to take off protection, climbing through the rubble, going down, encouraging Willi and John? The request for the medic, the medic and his alcoholism, his courage, going to help? The detail of the rescue, the engineering required, the personal approach, each being rescued? The applause?

15.The family’s going to the hospital, the wrong information? Donna and her confronting the policewoman at headquarters?

16.The police information, accurate and inaccurate?

17.The families waiting at the hospitals, the gradual good news?

18.Audiences’ overall view of the day itself, the ordinariness, the surprise, the amazement, the collapse, the destruction of the buildings – and surrounding buildings? The bewildered people at the site? The loss of so many police and firemen? The anxiety, the waiting? Ordinary people going about ordinary things outside New York City and waiting for news?

19.Two years later, the party, John and his greeting everybody, Willi, the new baby? The family reunited? A spirit of goodwill?

20.The consequences of the collapse of the World Trade Centre buildings, President Bush (glimpsed during the film) – and audience knowledge of his delay in Miami? The puzzles and the mysteries? The war against terrorism? The post-9/11 atmosphere – and this film contributing to more peace and reconciliation? Tribute?