World Trade Center

August 11, 2006

Rated: PG-13 Runtime: 125 min Rating: 2 out of 5 stars

Ok, so maybe I wasn’t in the right frame of mind when I went to see this movie. I mean, imagine finding out that you have the winning lotto ticket…and then 5 minutes later someone comes up to you and says your Aunt Myrtle just fell and broke her hip. Normally that downer moment would be just that - a downer. But when you’ve just won the lottery? Aunt who? Quick! Here’s a thousand dollars! Go buy me a give-a-shit!

And so it was that I was in a state of nirvana when I ventured in to to see World Trade Center. No, I didn’t win the lottery. If I had, y’all would never see any reviews from my skinny little ass again! But suffice to say that I got some really good news and was really happy at the time.

And then some idiots rammed a couple planes into some skyscrapers. And then some police went to try and evacuate the buildings. And then the buildings came tumbling down. Some of the police were trapped. Then they waited to be rescued. Then I got bored. I looked at my watch. They were still trapped. Then I started daydreaming about my good fortune again. Then I tuned back into the movie and…they were still trapped. But then they were spotted! And a rescue was soon underway. Yay! It’s over. Can I go home now?

That is how I saw the movie. Yeah, I guess some people think I’m dead inside *cough* *John* *cough*. If you haven’t heard by now, World Trade Center is about the entrapment and subsequent rescue of John McLoughlin & Will Jimeno, the 18th and 19th people pulled out of the rubble of Ground Zero. There were only 20 that made it.

Oliver Stone, bless his little heart of darkness, somehow managed to put away all his politics and make a simple movie about some brave people that did their jobs in the face of extraordinary danger. Some of them made it, most of them didn’t. Stone, for all his faults, is a very competent moviemaker and the work that went into WTC is all very top notch and very professional. And for those who think that this was an attempt to sensationalize the attacks, your fears are unfounded. You never see a plane hit a building and almost all of the shots of the buildings themselves are either from the perspective of the port authority officers or from television news broadcasts being watched by the families of those officers. Whether or not you agree that the movie was respectful of that horrific day or not, I think you’ll agree that Stone was trying very hard to be respectful.

Cage (McLoughlin) and Pena (Jimeno) put in what I can only describe as couple of very nice performances. Bello and Gyllenhaal do serviceable work as the wives of the two men. And then there was Michael Shannon as Lt. Dave Karnes, the ex-marine who put on his uniform, went down to the rubble of ground zero, and kept on searching even after everyone else had been told to back off for the night. I was especially impressed with his performance though he didn’t have all that much screen time.

I seem to be writing some rather flattering things about the movie, don’t I? So why only two stars? Well, the best way I can say it is that it just didn’t grab me. The point of making a highly dramatic flick like this is to get your audience emotionally hooked into the main characters and, in this case, I never felt a thing. So, when you miss the point that badly, there’s only so much you can do to make up for it.

Again, I plead that I may have been unduly influenced beforehand and you, the reader, may find it very emotionally gripping if you go to see it. Me? I just found it slow and tedious. In a more normal state of mind, I quite probably could have given this movie 3 or perhaps even 4 stars. But that is just playing “woulda coulda shoulda” with how I feel about it.

Posted by Alex | Filed Under 2 Stars, Drama, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Maria Bello, Michael Pena, Michael Shannon, Nicolas Cage, PG-13, Theatrical