by John Podhoretz
"WATCHING "World Trade Center," the new Oliver Stone movie about 9/11 that opens next week, I couldn't help but think of a brilliant remark director Stanley Kubrick once made about a universally praised film. "Think that was about the Holocaust?" Kubrick said. "That was about success, wasn't it? The Holocaust is about 6 million people who get killed. 'Schindler's List' was about 600 people who don't."
What Kubrick was saying is this: "Schindler's List" may be powerful, moving and an important reminder of a terrible crime, but it still manages to distort the meaning of the Holocaust by turning it into the setting for a traditional Hollywood "triumph of the human spirit over adversity" tale.
The same is true of "World Trade Center." It is undeniably powerful, an immensely affecting and well-meaning real-life tale of two Port Authority policemen trapped in the rubble underneath the collapsed concourse between the North and South Towers.
Nonetheless, because "World Trade Center" tells a story of joyous survival rather than a story of death, it is a fundamental falsification of the meaning of 9/11 - even though the story it tells is true.
The survival of John McLoughlin (a gaunt Nicolas Cage) and Will Jimeno (the brilliant Michael Pena) was truly a miracle. Pinned by concrete debris a few feet from each other, they talked to keep themselves alive. Meanwhile, a retired Marine named Dave Karnes heard the voice of God telling him to do what he could to help. Karnes put on his old uniform and went from Wilton, Conn., through the Chambers Street barricades and right onto the rubble, shining a flashlight and calling to survivors. He heard Jimeno flicking a pipe back and forth.
Because the TV news media decreed nearly five years ago that they would no longer show moving images of 9/11, Stone's recreation has immense power. It is impossible not to cry during the course of this movie. But that doesn't make "World Trade Center" exceptional. Truth to tell, the movie really isn't very good.
Much of the picture is taken up with the suffering and anxiety of the wives and families of McLoughlin and Jimeno, and the ultra-histrionic Stone simply has no idea how to film an ordinary scene in which four people sit in a house together. Instead, he slaps together clichés from World War II pictures and Lifetime's "movies for women" into an unconvincing, clichéd lump.
The movie ends with Nicolas Cage speaking a narration about how on 9/11 we faced adversity but also came together as a people and did nice things for each other. That certainly did happen, and America's emotional unity was something extraordinary to behold, but that is not what 9/11 was about - 9/11 was a day of barbaric mass murder, not a day of hope.
"World Trade Center" can't hold a candle either artistically or thematically to "United 93," the grueling and overpowering masterpiece released earlier this year that showed it all - the monstrous terrorists, the confused responders and the unimaginable heroics of those who forced the plane down before it could hit Washington.
"United 93" ends with a plane crash. "World Trade Center" ends with a smiling child. One wonders what Stanley Kubrick would have made of that."
Silly J-Pod. The only movies that end on a sinister note are those that prime the audience for Part II. This is the nature of the beast. Take it, leave it, but understand it or forever tilt at windmills. It is tremendously difficult to create a theatrical presentation that doesn't follow the 3-Act scenario without turning it into a documentary, John. And please now; Kubrick was one of the most talented cinematographers ever, but a horrid director who specialized in trying to break free of the 3-Act formulation and never, ever, succeeded. At the end of the day, we're left with what Hollywood has to offer, and admittedly it isn't much so expecting to squeeze truth from Stone is absurd. The only way to put an end to such undesireable fare is to stay home and let the empty theaters do the real talking, and since a thumbs-down review might assist in that such poor reviews might be worthwhile if they had more to offer other than "The Ending Sucked."
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