Review: World Trade Center (2006)

World Trade Center
2006
126 minutes
rated PG-13

by Scott Mendelson

World Trade Center is a relatively uninvolving story about two
policemen who enter a burning building and are trapped in rubble when
said building collapses. On it's face, the film isn't terribly
moving, the performances are barely adequate, and several key
characters are rendered in such broad strokes as to be unsettling or
unsympathetic. It's simply a badly made film, but will that matter to
audiences distracted by a 'nationalistic obligation' to embrace it?

World Trade Center concerns two policemen who were trapped in one of
the World Trade buildings in NYC when those buildings were hit by
passenger jets and collapsed on 9-11-01. Officers John McLouglin
(Nicolas Cage, doing what he can with very little character depth) and
Will Jimeno (Michael Pena, shining in the proverbial lead role) make
their way to the police station on that fateful Tuesday morning.
After receiving word that a plane has hit the World Trade Center, they
make their way to the building to assist with rescue efforts. They
enter the tower right as it falls and traps them in the rubble.

The first 25 minutes are simply spellbinding and riveting, as we see
pieces of the attack from the eyes of unknowing victims (this is the
only part that feels like an Oliver Stone film). The sense of
futility is stunning. It's obvious that the city was completely
unprepared in equipment and technology for this event (the stinging
acknowledgment of this is the only thing that comes close to making
any political statements, in an otherwise apolitical film).
Unfortunately, once John and Will fall into the ground, the film
becomes awash in melodramatic clichés.

The film then alternates between scenes of John and Will trying to
keep each other awake, scenes of their would-be rescuers, and scenes
of their families suffering. The scenes of our two attempted heroes
are worthwhile and entertaining. There is a tangible sense of dread,
as they both know that random fragments of the building or a random
spark could kill them at any moment. Unfortunately, the family
grieving scenes frankly reek of Lifetime clichés. Actually, the 90s
Lifetime movie about a woman trapped in rubble after the Oklahoma City
bombing is actually better than this film.

The wives are underdeveloped and their children alternate between cloy
and vile. John's son spends his scenes yelling at his mother for not
'doing something', behavior that is so naive and cruel that his
heartlessness hurts that whole portion of the movie. Meanwhile,
Will's pregnant wife (Maggie Gyllenhaal) has a slow nervous breakdown,
but her scenes of strife are nothing we haven't seen before in other,
better movies. Weirdly enough, Will's wife's (Caucasian) family is
presented as energetic, spirited, and can-do Americans, while Will's
(non-Caucasian) family is represented mainly by his mother kneeling on
the floor and helplessly weeping. Intentional or not, the symbolism
is disturbing.

Speaking of disturbing, the third thread concerns Dave Karnes (Michael
Shannon), a former marine who spearheaded the rescue effort.
Presented as a zealot who drove thousands of miles to help, he is
played (unintentionally?) as a genuinely scary figure, whose good
deeds dont mask the fact that he's quite frightening in his zealotry
(he has cold, dead eyes, believes that he is on a holy quest, and
speaks like he'll kill you if you disagree with him). Apparently,
several humanizing details were cut out of the film; so all were left
with is a Christian fanatic (as opposed to a merely devout Christian)
who finds his way onto Ground Zero in the dead of night.

Oddly, the film strives so hard to be uplifting and inspiring that it
almost forgets to present that day as a monumental tragedy as well (a
late, brief scene involving Viola Davis as a grieving mother feels
tacked on). Alas, the recent flawed remake of Poseidon presented a
more potent look at the tragedy of mass death (the mass drowning of
the ballroom passengers, with Andre Braugher hugging his friend as
they await doom, is heartbreaking).

So, in the end, we have a mediocre disaster film with undeveloped or
unsympathetic characters. We have cliched dialogue and situations
along with a boring second act. The film fails the key rule of based
on truth filmmaking. If this story were complete fiction, would it
still be worth seeing or half as effective? The filmmakers hope that
moviegoers will be swept up in the 'oh, but it's about 9/11' glow and
ignore the fact that this is really a mediocre motion picture. This
is not the great 9/11 epic of our time, and you don't have a patriotic
duty to embrace it.


grade: C