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The Unseen Movie Review: United 93

By Robert Dixter Apr 24, 2006, 16:50 GMT

A job, a wife, a baby and no free time. I haven’t seen the films but based on what I’ve heard and know, we’ll see if the movie is worth it.

I live in New York. I remember exactly what happened on September 11, 2001. I remember leaving work that day, trying to find my wife, and trying to get home. I also remember the panic in the streets for the next few days. I remember the pictures and postings of all over the place of missing people. And I remember the smell of smoke from my apartment that didn’t leave for more than a week.I do not need a movie five years later to remind me. The images from that day and the feelings people felt are still quite current. The biggest problem I have with this film is that it is not a documentary. It is not in any way news or factual clips. It is a recreation of what might have happened aboard flight 93. When people see this film they are seeing scary scenes played for a real effect, but the images they are witnessing are not true images, they have been recreated for this film in order to tell this story.The thing that bothers me the most about this film is that it has been made by a Hollywood studio and it is a product. It has been created to make money. The studio is asking you to take time out of your day and spend your money to see this film. It is playing at the multiplex next to American Dreamz and Scary Movie 4. There is a marketing department behind the push of this film. There have been meetings in Los Angeles about how to sell this movie, how to make money on it. People have weighed in on what the poster should look like (why is the Statue of Liberty on the poster? Because tying the collapse of the buildings in New York to the crash of flight 93 helps Universal pull at your heart and I guess according to Universal will hopefully put your butt in the theater).I’ve been reading articles where the cast talks about bonding on the set, and how they came to be really close and tight. This sounded like the same thing I heard from the actors making the upcoming Poseidon. Maybe my problem is that aside from living through this day in New York, I see people handling this movie like any other film release including prime time commercials during my must see TV. I know the filmmakers got permission from every family that had relatives on flight 93 and I know they are giving 10% of the box office from the first three days to the flight 93 National Memorial Fund. The people on flight 93 are definitely heroes and I would never say anything to take that away from them. But for me, it is too soon to see something like this and I was hoping Hollywood would have known better.

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