World Trade Center: A Paramount Pictures Film by Oliver Stone
In the harbor, on Ellis Island, Lady Liberty heard the explosions on the day the sirens wailed.
World Trade Center, a film directed by Oliver Stone and starring Nicolas Cage New York and New Jersey Port Authority Police Officer John McLoughlin and Michael Pena as fellow Police Officer Will Jimeno. Maria Bello beautifully plays Donna McLoughlin and Maggie Gyllenhal portrays Allison Jimeno as the families reactions to the events of September eleventh, 2001are narrated in this Paramount Pictures film, the first major motion picture to address the attack on the World Trade Center’s Twin Towers.
The World Saw Evil That Day. Two Men Saw Something Else, New York citizens helping each other after the cataclysmic collapse of the skyscrapers.
Historical movies create problems for the writer of the initial script treatment. Events must sequenced and the time compressed so that the story moves along, after all this is a film and it must be entertaining. OfficerJohn McLoughlin wrote the original treatment, so the audience can be assured that the events that occured on September eleventh and the effects on the families will be dipicted as he remembers.
Director Oliver Stone at the Cannes Film Festival in May of 2006: “It is the true story of two New York Port Authority policemen trapped in the rubble and their incredible, improbable rescue. History is shaped by collective memory, what I hope one day will be seen as truth. The truth must exist in some way to confront power and extremism. World Trade Center is the story of the humanity of 9-11, it’s not about the terrorists ,it’s not about the major part of the event itself. It’s about the families and loved ones and what they were going through that day.
“In this 24-hour document I tried to show, within the constraints of film, what it felt to experience this trauma and resurrection within an intimate circle of characters. The struggle is to make stories about the way people really see it.”
The “9-11 Families” have organized into several groups that form around different views about Ground Zero as the actual site where the Twin Towers once stood has come to be known. For some of them it will always be “too soon” to be reminded of that day and their personal losses. Movies are heavily advertised for several weeks prior to the release so it will be impossible for all Americans not to be reminded of that second week in September.
Oliver Stone will be accused of distorting the facts by certain political pundents who have been critical of his work going back to the 1991 film JFK that suggested that an organized criminal organization and United States government agents conspired to kill the president. This was responsible for the term conspiracy theories entering common useage in our language.
I attended a history class,and part of the course materials was a weekly historical film. A lot of these had News Reels (this was in the days before television “News” broadcasts) as a major portion of the films. These were made to be shown,along with cartoons for the kiddies, between the “double features” at movie-houses across America. These were produced for an audience with the average education at the time, which in the 1920’s and 30’s was the sixth-grade.
Today we would call News Reel coverage “propaganda” but at the time most Americans would have said that they dipicted an accurate version of, then current events.
If a historian today would examine the official documents of those days and the events related in the News Reels for their accuracy and objectivity, would she be criticized for having a political bias? An example of this would be investigating the shooting of President Lincoln by John Wilkes Booth in Ford’s Theater in Washington in 1865. We would compare the newspaper reports of that night’s events and the capture of the conspirators with the United States Army’s later reports. Every few years a new book is published with new information about someone on the fringe of that group of people. Historians keep asking questions and adding to our knowledge about that event.
This is what Director Oliver Stone did with the film JFK, asked questions and endeavored to answer them. For this he was criticized and accused of having a political bias.
As we are now starting to experience the after-effects of 9-11: drivers licenses cost three-times as much and we can’t pick one of our ex-husband’s names we like the best, to register to vote we now have to give our driver’s license and Social Security Numbers on the form and we have to make sure to wear new underwear before going to the airport on our vacations. I hope we continue to have academics and everyday guys, like Nicolas Cage plays, asking questions about those events.
