World Trade Center - Austin American-Statesman movie review

'World Trade Center' finds hope in horror

By JOHN DeFORE
Austin American-Statesman

As a piece of cinema, "World Trade Center" isn't half the film "United 93" is.

But artistry isn't the only thing we want from movies, and it seems clear that "World Trade Center" is the film more Americans have been waiting for (if they want a film about this subject in the first place), one that, instead of staring into the abyss of Sept. 11 and grappling with horror, digs through the tragedy to find something that reassures us about the strength of the human spirit and the character of our nation. A 9/11 story with a happy ending.

Paramount Pictures

'World Trade Center'

3 out of 5 stars

The verdict: Even the usually suspicious Oliver Stone isn't immune to a case of uncomplicated patriotism.

Director: Oliver Stone
Starring: Nicolas Cage, Michael Peña, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Maria Bello, Stephen Dorff
Run time: 125 minutes
Release date: August 9, 2006
Rating: PG-13 for intense and emotional content, some disturbing images and language.
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Behind the scenes
• Will Jimeno had only one thought: Save the people.
• What? An Oliver Stone film with no conspiracy theories?
• Says the director: "The lie has been, Oliver Stone makes up history."

On the web
Official movie site
View the trailer
Trailers require Quicktime

Strange, then, that Oliver Stone should be the one to tell it. The filmmaker has devoted his career to shining light on American moments of doubt and shame, but his take on this story is as unambiguous as a '40s war epic. It's a tale of good men who face adversity and survive, of a country made stronger by catastrophe. It's an almost shockingly conventional movie, bearing few traces of its maker's personality.

While it takes its subject very seriously indeed, "World Trade Center" shies away from (or, maybe, is just incapable of) re-creating the heart-stopping horror of that morning. Aside from one scene, in which we witness a body falling from the flaming towers, Stone isn't interested in the psychological effect the attacks had on those who witnessed them. Even before the buildings collapse, he is focused on the practical experience of two men who will be trapped beneath them.

They're men who don't grasp the history that's happening around them. John McLoughlin's team of Port Authority cops launches rescue efforts slowly, and it's to Stone's credit that he doesn't transform them from actual rescue workers into action-movie heroes. McLoughlin (Nicolas Cage) makes his men trudge around gathering more oxygen tanks and other supplies than they seem to need, and when one of the officers voices the audience's impatience with this chore, Cage replies calmly: "You aren't rescuing anybody if you can't breathe, Rodrigues."

Before they even get into the stairwell, though, the towers collapse, leaving McLoughlin and Will Jimeno (Michael Peña) immobilized. We're trapped in the rubble with them, wondering how a filmmaker will handle a situation in which his heroes are incapable of helping themselves.

As in "United 93," the solution is to spend a good deal of screen time away from the action itself, with those who are responding to it from afar. But where Paul Greengrass dramatized history documentary-style, churning through details of military and air-traffic-control procedure, Stone focuses on personalities: The wives who go near-crazy wondering if their husbands are alive; the firefighters who travel from neighboring states to offer help. And, crucially, a sole former Marine who hears the news at work, knows immediately that "this country's at war," and heads out to do what civilians cannot.

That man, Dave Karnes (Michael Shannon), is the fulcrum of the story this movie has chosen to tell — the straight-edge Marine who sneaks out onto the rubble after police and firefighters call it a night, and stays until he finds someone to rescue — and it is a strange thing to see this living military stereotype be the savior in an Oliver Stone movie.

But the pickings are slim for anyone wanting to make a feel-good movie about Sept. 11. You take your heroes where you can find them, and even the usually suspicious Oliver Stone isn't immune to a case of uncomplicated patriotism.