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World Trade Center "is a solid piece of filmmaking."
by Jonathan V. Last, Weekly StandardIT IS DIFFICULT, maybe even impossible, to render critical judgment on a movie such as World Trade Center. The normal aspects of appraisal are meaningless. It would be absurd to measure the film by its pacing or its cinematography. Ultimately, the only thing that matters is whether or not it feels right, and even that nebulous criterion probably has more to do with the viewer than the movie. All of that said, Oliver Stone's World Trade Center is a solid piece of filmmaking. WTC is an important movie. There were three stories from 9/11 which needed to be told. The first, about the doomed heroics of Flight 93, was brought to the screen by Paul Greengrass earlier this spring. The second, about the FAA's struggle to clear the skies and land 4,452 planes in 180 minutes, has yet to be made. But Stone has picked the most dramatically satisfying part of the triptych: The story of Will Jimeno, John McLoughlin, Dave Karnes, and Charles Sereika (see this fantastic Rebecca Liss piece for the full tale). Jimeno (played by Michael Peña) and McLoughlin (Nicholas Cage) were Port Authority officers who went into the Trade Center to help with the evacuation. When the first building collapsed, they were pinned down and buried in an elevator shaft. Karnes (Michael Shannon) was a retired Marine working as an accountant in Connecticut. When he saw the news on the television at his office, he left, went to a barber for a buzzcut, put on his old uniform, and drove straight to Ground Zero, where he headed out onto the pile, searching for survivors. Authorities were calling the official workers back because night was falling and the area was unsafe. Amidst the carnage, Karnes hooked up with another man, Sgt. Jason Thomas (William Mapother), and the two roamed Ground Zero, shouting, over and over, "United States Marines, if you can hear us, yell or tap!" After an hour, they heard something: Jimeno and McLoughlin, still alive under 20 feet of rubble. Thomas went for backup, which arrived in the form of Charles Sereika (Frank Whaley), a recovering alcoholic and a former paramedic, who had also put on an old uniform and come to the crater to help. Sereika, Karnes, and then others, dug for hours to rescue Jimeno and McLoughlin. Stone tells the story with confidence and an astonishing degree of empathy. . . . if anything, the only criticism which Stone could be open to with WTC is that he's too sentimental, that he feels the material too deeply. He lacks the clinical dispassion Greengrass brought to United 93. Some audiences may see this as a failing; I suspect most will not. That Stone was able to make a steady, emotionally fulfilling movie from this amazing source material should come as little surprise to those familiar with his work. But what is surprising--astonishing, even--is that Stone has made a full-blown Jesus movie. World Trade Center is filled with Christianity. Karnes goes to church to pray before heading to Manhattan and Stone focuses for long stretches of this scene on the cross above the altar. There are crucifixes and rosaries everywhere. McLoughlin's emergence from the pit is shot as though it were the resurrection. Christ even appears in the film, twice. And all of this is handled not with condescension or even with a distant respectfulness, but with actual reverence. Posted by: Mike 2006-08-04 |
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