A Dose of Reality?

The film, "United 93" opens today and the big question on everyone's mind is whether it is too early for such a film to be released. Going on nearly five years since the tragedy of September 11th, this is one of the first films to dramatize the events of what happened aboard United Airlines Flight 93, the flight where the passengers reportedly rallied together and fought the terrorists, thus preventing the plane from being crashed into another target in Washington D.C.

Many of the test audiences so far have given the film very positive reviews stating that the film has portrayed the plight of the passengers in a realistic but not overly dramatized light. Rather than creating a Hollywoodized version of the film with superhero style actions and rescues, the film is supposed to show the situation in a way that borders on reality. Using handheld camera and jerky camera movements, it gives the audience a sense of actually being aboard the flight and taking part in the action and the tragedy. Is that a good thing? Well, I suppose it depends.

Back when "Saving Private Ryan" opened in theaters, there was public outcry regarding the realistic depiction of the landing at Omaha Beach. Groups protested saying that it was overly done and too gory for audiences. There were fears that veterans would have relapses and suffer breakdowns in seeing such violence depicted again. But surprisingly, the majority of veterans who saw the film and took part in the actual invasion applauded the filmmakers for showing audiences what the horrors of war were really like. Was there someone like Tom Hanks on the beaches of Normandy? Quite possibly. Is it a realistic depiction of the action. Definitely. Is it historically accurate?

Well... that's a separate issue. The actual battle on Omaha beach lasted for hours and was just as difficult as shown in the film, however, no studio would have allowed a film to be done in real-time which showed the horrors of war for that long. The bottom line in movies is money and it's important that the film do well enough to make money. What do you do then? Condense, combine, and dramatize.

Movies based on actual events are rarely spot on depictions of a situation. Screenwriters will take known incidents and events and often combine them to heighten the action or speed up the timeline. Events are sometimes shown out of order as well. This is not done to detract from the reality of the situation, but to give the audience a quick snapshot of the event in question.

How realistic or accurate is "United 93"? From all accounts, the screenwriters have used as much information as they were able to access to ensure that the depiction of the characters was as grounded in reality as possible. They interviewed families of the victims and reviewed the tapes of phone conversations that were made before the flight lost contact. A lot of what happened on the flight can only be speculated and inferred. Whether the actions shown in the movie are actually what happened or not is something we may never know, but as filmmakers, it is their job to depict events in the way they feel best conveys the story.

Is it too soon to see something like this? I personally don't believe that it is. After Pearl Harbor there were films that came out that rallied the American people around the war effort and encouraged them to remain vigilant and do their part for their country. Will this film have the same effect? Who knows. It could reaffirm the support for the war on terrorism that continues in Asia and the Middle East. It could also raise more questions in the minds of Americans as to how this tragedy could have happened.

Whatever the film does, I don't think it's doing it to make money off of a tragic event in our nation's history. Movies, at the best of times, can make us aware of things we only have a passing knowledge of. They make us see things we may not have want to have seen or experience. It's important to never forget the people who died on that day. It's equally important that when we remember them in a way that doesn't show them in an unrealistic light.