? Oliver Stone recounts a day, September 11, 2001, in the life of two NYC Port Authority police officers who become trapped underneath the rubble of the fallen Twin Towers. Nicholas Cage and Michael Peña portray John McLoughlin and Will Jimeno. The view shifts between the trapped men and their families, with Maria Bello and Maggie Gyllenhaal playing the anxious wives. For Stone, known for controversial works such as JFK, it’s a surprisingly apolitical film. (It’s the first produced feature for screenwriter Andrea Berloff.)
+ Each of the
real-life couples participated in making the movie, and it comes off as
realistic and non-exploitative. The movie hints at fissures in the marriage of
McLoughlin, and implies that his ordeal was a transformative experience for
him, but never threatens to become a melodrama. Despite the potential for
cheesiness, it rarely comes off that way. (I thought the vision of Jesus was
one exception, even if that’s what Jimeno actually saw.) Cage gives a suitably
restrained performance.
- The parts with the
families at home, including the flashbacks, were less compelling than those
with the trapped men. The apolitical tone is a plus and a minus. Although the
story being told didn’t particularly lend itself to a political film, the movie
could use some kind of edge.
= **3/4 For me, United
93 definitively recalled the feeling I had on 9/11. At the same time, it
was a portrait of frenzied activity. This is a different kind of movie, more
personalized to its primary characters. For McLoughlin and Jimeno, 9/11 was an
hour of confusion, then a slow, literally painful wait. After the first
building falls on them, you could forget that this is a 9/11 film.
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