I can’t explain how I feel about the movie United 93 any better than this.
- I’m also completely unsure that I can handle it properly in a public space. So, I’m going to do the absolute minimum and buy a couple of tickets online to make sure I’m voting with my wallet.
May 2, 2006 at 5:15 pm
Just had to say yours is the single best name for a blog I’ve come across yet … I’m glad I got up the nerve to see this very good and very powerful film, though I must confess I found myself turning away from the screen at several points in the harrowing final act
May 3, 2006 at 7:18 am
‘If United 93 fails at the box office, the war on terror will be rewritten in popular culture’? Goodness. As the author already states, since when have we counted on Hollywood to provide a conservative view of pop culture? The author comes across to me as saying abstinence from seeing a movie will undermine history. Sounds like either way, Hollywood wins.
May 3, 2006 at 9:03 am
Keith:
Thanks! I’m sure it comes as no surprise that I thought that up while drinking scotch. 🙂
K:
We’re not counting on Hollywood to provide a view of conservative or liberal anything. However, they do have a huge influence on pop culture and I would guess that a large chunk of Hollywood honestly wanted this film to fail. Maybe that’s just the conspiracy theorist in me but I bet it’s not.
History only really exists in the way we tell it. If Fahrenheit 9/11 and Syriania were the only popular films about the war on terror, I’d think that a large segement of the population would view history from what they learned from those films. With the success of United 93, I think less of the hyperbole and political bullshit gets written into pop culture. From what I know of the movie, it’s a very honest, unbiased interpretation of the events of United 93. I think it’s important that a movie like that can be made.
But in the end, yes Hollywood always wins.
May 3, 2006 at 10:56 am
Why on earth would Hollywood want this film to fail? But your last paragraph is all good, yo. All indications point to this being a very good movie (Mr. Demko and others I know who have seen it, included). However I don’t agree that so much importance should be placed on this one film; I’m inclined to think part of it is because it seems to be one of the first (finally!) decent cinematic responses to FH 9/11. Yet there will certainly be many more to come (the new Oliver Stone one, for example) and with continually differing points of view.
Take the WW II movies, for example. There’s probably hundreds, and a new one is shown in the US almost every year. (and only recently was a movie made portraying Hitler as truly human. It was quite a long time until we were ‘ok’ with that!) However, in our current war, the story line isn’t remotely as clear-cut. I wonder if the lack of movies is because it’s taking everyone so long to figure out what the heck is going on! This history is going to take a long long time to be written, and in the meantime, Hollywood will just be guessing or playing catch-up.
May 3, 2006 at 11:34 am
They’d want it to fail because it doesn’t fit in their world view. In a completely unscientific study, I hit 5 or 6 of the top liberal blogs from this site just to see if they said anything about the movie. Results were pretty much zip. Did the same thing for Fahrenheit 911 and got tons of hits. While this doesn’t at all prove my point, I think it gives some credence to my “conspiracy theory”.
Movies showing ordinary citizens exhibiting patriotism and courage will never be very popular in today’s movie business.
May 3, 2006 at 1:15 pm
Well, I don’t know any statistics, but I thought that Saving Private Ryan and Schindler’s List were pretty big hits. (ach, still with WWII.. such a romantic topic now) I dunno. My offering to your argument is that the subject matter of U93 might be a lot more difficult for people to watch.. or maybe lots of people are thinking, ‘ok, I know what happened, do I really need to see a movie about it?’.. or maybe, if you want to compare it again to FH 9/11, I’m guessing a lot of people went to see that because it was such an incredibly confusing, incredibly heated time and they were wanting to see if he had anything of interest to say. Nowadays there seems to be a general feeling of apathy toward the whole situation and I imagine that reflects on the movie receipts. It’ll be interesting to see how it compares to the Oliver Stone movie whenever it comes out.
May 3, 2006 at 2:01 pm
They were definitely big hits. They were also Spielberg movies with big time stars, stars who were the darling of Hollywood. U93 was a low-budget, no-star movie that for the most part sticks to the facts known about the history in question, not seeking to interpret, only to examine the actions of those passengers. On top of that, few people would question our motives for the history of WWII.
Possibly a closer comparison would be another Spielberg film, Munich (hey, another moview we haven’t seen!). Lots of politics there, plenty of heated feelings about right and wrong and a situation that makes lots of people uncomfortable. I’d argue that people went to F911 either completely convinced it was the gospel or completely convinced it was a sham. It was clearly politically charged, out to make a point at any expense. U93 is clearly apolitical and thus, probably more difficult to watch.
There was definitely some discussion prior to U93’s release as to how America would treat the film. It’s interesting to see the studio tracking survey info in that article and then see what actually happened.