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Directed by: Oliver Stone Starring: Nicholas Cage, Michael Peņa, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Maria Bello A local radio station here in Harrisburg, PA hosted a sneak preview of this film tonight, and I was lucky enough to snag a ticket to the show (the movie opens nationwide August 9). World Trade Center is very much a historical drama, told in a fairly objective point-of-view. The only real mentions of politics that I noticed are footage of Bush's quick address-the-nation from Louisiana on September 11, and a reserve marine telling his boss that he doesn't know when he'll coming back to work because he's expecting war. This true story (a notice at the beginning of the film states that the story is based on the accounts of the "participants" of 9/11) follows two New York City cops (Cage and Peņa) and their families (their wives are played by Bello and Gyllenhaal) as they live through their own personal hell on September 11, 2001. A bit of a B-story is centered around a US Marine Corps reserve officer (played by Michael Shannon) who leaves his day job in New England and makes his way into the rubble of Ground Zero. This is very much an ensemble story, not just a Nicholas Cage! summer blockbuster - Michael Peņa is in nearly every scene with him, and their screen time is almost evenly split with Maria Bello, Maggie Gyllenhall, and the cop's families. Oliver Stone makes a few interesting directing choices: there is not a single shot of a plane hitting a tower (the most we see is a shadow passing over the streets of NYC) - we do see the smoking, burning towers. The only footage of the building collapse comes from archive CNN footage - but we follow characters that are trapped inside the WTC complex as the buildings come down, and I'll tell you, I was just a bit terrified. Shots or people walking through the smoke and debris-strewn streets of Manhattan are straight out of any post-Apocalyptic film, and it's a very moving image. The dialogue really conveys the sense of confusion that overtook the nation that morning, with archive footage of news anchors quoting incorrect flight numbers, characters claiming that "a rocket hit the Pentagon, and Israel got nuked" - one character doesn't even realize that the Towers collapsed until he's pulled from the rubble. The only things that distracted me were a weird fever dream of Jesus and a water bottle that really could have been cut out without missing anything; and characters buried in rubble are barely visible in some scenes. If you look closely, you'll see cameos of Ethan from  and Curtis and Mike Novick from :24: .RATING: 4 PROS: Objective storytelling, lack of politics, ensemble cast, use of real news footage CONS: Slightly too long, a bizzare fever dream, too dark in places ADDITIONAL INFORMATION: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0469641/ GBS DISCUSSION THREAD: http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=1991627 Edit: Why are all these people voting down the movie before it hits nationwide release? Vote on the film itself, not whether or not you think it should have been made. 
Aatrek fucked around with this message at 23:35 on Aug 10, 2006 |
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Aug 2, 2006 03:58
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| # ? Apr 27, 2024 07:28 |
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This movie's message was cemented early on. Michael Peņa's Officer Jimeno is helping a family of lost Asian tourists when the shadow of a plane -- like the swooping Angel of Death -- suddenly and briskly blots out the sky. This fleeting moment of panic is the first time that humans are linked to other humans in the ensuing chaos. Director Oliver Stone returns to this idea with a montage of countries around the world watching the attacks unfold in stunned silence. The world seemed to form a connection with America in that time; before there was retaliation and before there was war, there was despair. The two Port Authority Policemen trapped under the rubble felt that same connection and Stone suggests that their survival depends on eachother, two more men brought together to give one another hope. The movie worked better as an examination of individual suffering. One of the more jarring scenes features a woman covered in blood, screaming about fire and running away from a crowd of still-clean rescuers. She represents the American people, isolated by what it suffered that day. I'll admit I laughed out loud during the trailer when it said, "A true story." But without that preface, I wouldn't have believed such a miraculous story of human bonding. The movie was weakest in its intense Christian undertones, and, while it was probably necessary, the conversations depicted of the trapped men did nothing to further the message. I believe a stronger theme would've been to show more of how their distraught wives managed to keep their families from falling apart. 4.5
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Aug 10, 2006 05:23
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Aatrek posted:The only things that distracted me were a weird fever dream of Jesus and a water bottle that really could have been cut out without missing anything; and characters buried in rubble are barely visible in some scenes. I laughed at this in the theater and got some odd looks. I'm glad to see im not the only person to think this was pointless. It's interesting to see an objective look at the events 'as they happened.' It brings back all the weird conjecture I had dropped after they had been replaced with something solid. Also, it bothered me that the rescue team talked about the rubble coming down like a house of cards, then they pull them out and theres like 700 people standing on it. Well acted, slightly long. I think i got my 7 bucks out of it. 4/5
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Aug 11, 2006 17:22
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I saw this movie last night in a pretty empty theater. I enjoyed the movie and knew what to expect because I read the Time article on it with an interview with Oliver Stone. To clear things up the dream sequence mentioned earlier was an actual hallucination, one of many the men experienced under the towers, and I think it was put in for the reason the character mentions, for hope that someone was coming for them. I think Stone did a good job of connecting this idea of the rescuer being Kearns during his first scene in the church talking to the priest and looking at the cross, which Jesus adorned as a necklace in the dream scene. I think this was the real reason the Jesus scene was involved. Stone himself wanted to make a movie about the connection between people and hope, and I think he did just that. After the first 6 minutes of film the viewer is thrust into what was happening and finds themselves relieving the day. You can actually see wall clocks with times appropriate to the times before the towers were going to fall, so you as an educated viewer knew about how much time they had. The quick talks between passing policeman are accurate and unfortunate as many of the mentioned characters were not survivors but listed in the end credits. One thing that I had forgot is that weird noise that kept going on during that day, the one that sounds like car alarms or bugs chirping or something, but as soon as I heard it again I was instantly reminded of that noise. As a side note one thing that was cut from the film was the Marine coming down to NY in his Porsche 911 Turbo, which is what really happened, because Stone didn't want it to come across as "too Hollywood." There were a few minutes of film that left me unintersted, but was thrust back into the film when the story of the wives was brought about. When the connection to the family and the trapped was brought into play the emotion came back into the movie and stayed till the end. There were even a few chuckles to the conversations between Cage and Pena in the audience. Overall I really enjoyed it, if you have surround sound in your house and a good size TV you could probably wait for the DVD because it's not an overdone stylized Stone movie at all, but an elegent drama based on the facts and very accurate. 4/5
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Aug 11, 2006 21:01
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This movie blew me away. The performances were top-notch and the things seen will make you relive that day. I'm of the camp that feels Tribute.wmv is one of the funniest things in the known universe, but this movie had me the entire time. Excellent movie, excellent acting. Go see it now. You owe it to yourself to see what these people went through. After watching this film I have a new respect for everyone involved. 5.5/5
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Aug 13, 2006 05:58
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| # ? Apr 27, 2024 07:28 |
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This is a solid movie, but this is no United 93. There are a lot of cliches, and there are many very stupid moments and dialog. The first half of the movie is downright boring. But the acting from the two wives is excellent and the production is good. And there are a few emotional moments in the movie, but overall it comes off as a regular disaster movie - I sometimes even forgot I was watching a movie about 9/11 with all the constant talk about heroism and family and america it really reminded me of Apollo 13. This may be a good movie, but it's not about 9/11. I really hope that by the end of the year people will realize how much this movie is inferior to United 93. Except acting, this should not receive any academy nominations. 3.5 / 5 Pinkied_Brain fucked around with this message at 03:44 on Aug 18, 2006 |
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Aug 18, 2006 03:41
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