United 93

Saturday night, I saw United 93.

It was not a typical night at the movies.


I can’t remember the last time I was at a movie when the audience applauded at the end. That happened when United 93 was over.

I’m not sure what the people were applauding. The film-making? The acting?

Perhaps they weren’t applauding the movie at all. Maybe they were honoring the people who boarded United Airlines Flight 93 on September 11, 2001, and died fighting the terrorists.

Of course, there are no plot twists or surprises in this film. How could there be? We all know the story. The ending is never in question.

Thankfully, the film doesn’t fall into that typical Hollywood trap of turning a historical event into a sappy tale, creating lovers and heroes and demons for dramatic appeal. Instead, United 93 seems like a documentary, following the story of the fourth hijacked aircraft in real time.

More important than its realistic time frame is the way it follows the people on the plane and on the ground. A number of reviews have stated how fair the film is in that it doesn’t canonize or demonize anyone.

That’s true to a certain extent. Due to the film’s documentary style, there is an impression of impartiality. I think that’s a false impression.

Some may consider it detached and nonjudgmental. I don’t.

United 93’s writer and director Paul Greengrass’ story-telling isn’t grounded in the safety of emotional remoteness. I think he doesn’t tell his audience who to identify as the good guys or the bad guys for the simple reason that it’s completely unnecessary.

It’s clear who the heroes and the villains are. It's also frightening to acknowledge that although the horrible events of 9/11 reside in history, the threat posed by radical Islam is as present today as it was on that September morning in 2001.

I found the opening scenes to be very powerful. I could really relate to the people going about their routines like we all do, the mundane nature of “just another day.” That made it especially painful to watch, knowing that for the people on Flight 93 it would be their last day. That's another scary acknowledgment -- how incredibly fragile life is. No guarantees.

The actors playing the terrorists did a masterful job of relaying both their anxiety and fear while at the same time showing their unwavering devotion to their mission and their beliefs. The terrorists were portrayed as human, but not sympathetic figures.

They fully embraced the teachings of militant Islam. They wanted to attack America. They wanted to terrify and to kill.

When the terrorists took over the plane, I had to avert my eyes during the scenes of the brutal murders of passengers and crew members. I couldn’t look – too violent, too much blood.

For me, the most wrenching scenes were the several snippets, five or ten second segments, of passengers calling their loved ones. Again and again, passenger after passenger was shown saying that final “I love you.” Not a long dramatic speech, just a simple “I love you.”

Those most beautiful words, "I love you," were absolutely heartbreaking.

Toward the end, Greengrass did something that really highlighted the senselessness and incomprehensibility of the 9/11 attacks. He juxtaposed the passengers’ prayers, tearful recitations of the “Our Father,” with images of the terrorists mumbling their own prayers.

Here they were, the victims and the murderers, on a doomed plane, all talking to God. That is so hard to reconcile. Was God listening?

When the passengers and crew stormed the cockpit and tried to seize control of the plane, it was at once horrifying and inspiring. They knew about the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. They knew that they were aboard a suicide mission, so they fought.

I don’t think there’s any question that they were fighting to save themselves and to see their families again; but they also knew that they were battling an enemy intent on killing more Americans.

So, they banded together and chose to fight back. They chose to fight for their lives. These brave people did not surrender. They would not passively accept defeat.

In the film's final moments, amid the chaos of the struggle for the plane, the camera shifts out the window, to the field below, the green grass getting closer and closer. At the point of impact, there is silence – no thunderous crash or flames, just silence and a black screen.

Then, I could hear the sniffling of many in the theater, crying like me.

I felt similar to how I did on 9/11. Of course, there wasn’t that sort of paralysis or suffocating feeling of shock, but there was that same feeling of disbelief.

Those four merciless human beings on Flight 93, and the fifteen hijackers on the other planes, chose to kill in the name of God.

"Allahu akbar!"

"God is Great!"

THEY TRAINED, PLOTTED, AND KILLED IN THE NAME OF GOD.

I still have not come to terms with that.

United 93 is a dramatic reminder that we are at war with an ideology, one that exploits God to justify the killing of innocents.

It's a reminder that the only borders in this War on Terror are found in the minds of those that believe slaughtering non-Muslim men, women, and children is what God wants.

The film is also a tribute to the human spirit, to those brave men and women who desperately wanted to live. They did all that they could to get off of that plane alive, battling the barbarism of the terrorists. In that sense, United 93 is uplifting. It soars.

Only God knows how many lives were saved by their sacrifice.