UNITED 93

by Kevin Koehler

Invariably, the first question people asked upon this film's release was "is it too soon?" Absurd, really. Whether we want it to be or not, 9/11 is the defining event of our lives. It's about time we talked about it like grownups, not bumper stickers.

The second question people asked is "why," as in, why make this movie? Conspiracy theorists aside, most people are fully aware of what happened that day. The heroics of United Flight 93 are well-documented - do we need the facts recounted for us one more time?

Except movies are not simply recounting of facts, as much as An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge is a recounting of a hanging. The best filmmaking brings flesh to bone and there are few dancing skeletons that could use more humanity than 9/11. More a political football than a living, breathing thing, its dusty remains are trotted out for a cabaret routine every time there’s photo opportunity to be had, an election to be won, or someone wants to wiretap our phones. We live under the specter 9/11, slaves to a ghost we can feel but not always see.

Above all other things, Paul Greengrass' wonderful United 93 reminds us that the victims and perpetrators of 9/11 are human beings; the bin Ladens and Bushes of the world (and indeed, the participants in this film) may invoke God in their struggles, but that terrible day in September was very much the act of man. Mohammed did not hijack a plane - Mohammed Atta did. This should be obvious, but sadly, it is not. We find comfort in order, not chaos, and there are few things more chaotic to our structured existence of traffic jams, ATMs, and Starbucks than mass death played out live on CNN. 9/11 began as a day like any other; the people on United flight 93 showered, shaved, had children, ate breakfast, made small talk, and cried when faced with their own mortality. What happened on that airplane happened, not to angels, but people, and these people could very well been us.

And we are quite alone.

I can’t help but chuckle every time I read a new 9/11 conspiracy theory when, in truth, the federal government is too bureaucratically inept to manage any complex sinister plot adequately. There is no shadowy figure pulling all the strings - indeed, President Bush is notable in United 93 for his complete absence (I interpret this is a statement rather than a lack one). It's a scary world; in a way, we're all in the cockpit of United flight 93, hurtling towards the ground, grabbing feebly at controls we don't even know how to use.

Some may see this as cynical. I see it as empowering. When I was younger, I remember driving home from Yankee Stadium, peering across the river at the Manhattan skyline and thinking man was truly capable of great things. Those terrorists took part of the greatness away that day, but the passengers of flight 93 put a different kind of transcendence in its place. The nobility of gods is un-relatable; it is the nobility of man that inspires.

Interesting footnote: Lewis Alsamari, an Iraqi-born British actor who plays one of the hijackers, tried to attend the U.S. premiere of United 93 but was refused a visa for having been a member of the Iraqi army. Alsamari had been conscripted into service and deserted in 1993, living in Britain under refugee status since that time.

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