So I thought I had the theatrical movie version of United Flight 93 on my Netflix queue. Turns out I had the television version. United 93 (film) versus Flight 93 (tv). I couldn't understand why the director in one of the interviews at the end wasn't Paul Greengrass.
It was heartbreaking even still. Very emotional. Now I'm left with deciding whether to put myself through the ringer watching the one I had planned.
Ironically, after it ended, and after I sat there sort of stunned, I was flipping through the channels and came across Red Dawn. It would be hard to imagine a greater contrast in the portrayal of heroism. Red Dawn turned my stomach, even in the 45 seconds I watched. It is the worst kind of flag-waving cartoon. The kind of thing that gets people thinking that war is not hell. The kind of thing that people leave the theater pumping their fist after.
Blech.
To be clear, pumping your fist after a movie isn't a bad thing, just doing it based on completely artificial depictions of us versus them, black and white world bullshit.
As Sting once said, "I bet the Russians love their children too."
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Based on what we know about our government's ability (not just ability, but almost pathological COMPULSION TO) distort facts about US casualties (e.g. Pat Tillman, Jessica Lynch), it would be hard for me to watch one of the flight 93 movies and not be wondering if a HUUUGE portion of it was utterly fictional.
But Red Dawn - blech is right. I remember, as a 12 year old or whatever, thinking it was the coolest beans ever. Of course, fist pumping 12-year olds was the exact demographic that movie was aimed at.
People may love their (own, flesh and blood) children, but a lot of the string pullers involved in this current war (from our president & his inner circle to the legions of sick bastards who blow themselves & innocents up over ideology) have not a care or compassion for anything else in this world. I wonder sometimes if we're totally fucked, at this point. More on this to come in the Oliopolis.
I'll just add that the Greengrass film is amazing stuff.
Fist pumpers with the mental faculties of a 12 year old maybe, but that may be an insult to some portion of 12 year olds.
The Flight 93 story is certainly ripe for distortion. One aspect of it that makes me willing to buy into the relative truth of the telling is that some of the conversations included in the movies were recorded for posterity, and there were an enormous number of people associated with the various pieces.
There were private planes who saw Flight 93 at various points along its path.
There were numerous people who received phone calls from people on the plane including at least one that was to a Verizon call center that was recorded and transcribed.
And ultimately, for all the original bluster about Cheney giving the shoot down order, investigations seem to indicate it had already crashed before this happened.
I'm certainly willing to entertain conspiracy theories of all sorts, and expect this particular administration to politicize everything, but as with most conspiracies the more moving parts there are, the harder it is to pull off.
And if nothing else, it's one of those gripping bits of drama that gets you thinking about how you would react in the same situation.
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