It wasn't that it was that good a movie.
But the performances, by mostly unknown actors, shuddered with emotion -- love, panic, pity, fear.
It happened in what would, I assume, have been real time. What was compelling to me were the faces of the air-traffice controllers as first one, then two, then three, then four planes went off course. The few air-traffic controllers I know are, for want of a better word, controlling. They do think of the airplanes as entering their sky. As they scrambled to make sense of what was happening, we could almost smell their fear and rage.
The scenes flashed back and forth between Air Traffic Control in Washington, D.C. and the interior of the cockpit on Flight 93, which, of course, crashed in Pennsylvania not long after 10 a.m. on September 11, 2001, before it could plough into the Capitol. Crew members and passengers, truly heroes, took over the plane from four terrorists.
Their ordeal was long. Never have I seen the theory of relativity demonstrated so well. For about fifteen minutes, they endured ten lifetimes of anguish, an eternity of fear. And they did what they needed to do -- perhaps more than anyone else did that morning, more than the military, more than the president. They put their country's welfare ahead of their own, hoping to survive, knowing they would not.
Still, perhaps the most poignant scene was, for me, watching individuals check in to Flight 93.
They passed their bags through a scanner. They walked through a metal detector. But they smiled and joked with the examiners in a way that we simply cannot do anymore. A joke of a particular kind, however innocent, is reason for closer scrutiny. Smiles, even genuine smiles, are forced. The relief, when I can pass through the gate and -- these days -- finally buy a coffee, is palpable.
I travel for business every month for at least a few days; and the moment when I wait to be screeened still is the most anxious moment of the trip. I want to be safe; I want everyone to be safe. But that feeling of adversarial distress has never gone away: We all are the enemy until proven otherwise.
So much has been written about September 11 that anything anyone writes in commemoration of its fifth anniversary is redundant. But when I cried over the movie 'Flight 93,' it wasn't only for the gallantry in the face of death displayed by the passengers and crew.
I cried for the time when we were free.
Jackie M.
Comments (2)
Beautiful
Posted by Michael Schofield | September 9, 2006 7:10 PM
Posted on September 9, 2006 19:10
Jackie, I hope you don't mind my rant. I am going to watch United 93 but I had to leave the movie with Nick Gage about the towers because it was just to painful. It was an attact on us, Americans, Americans of all national backgrounds, the land of the free, a direct hit!!!
I believe the terriorist have made a significant win against the United States. The have changed the complection of both business and pleasure travel. The businesses that support this travel security have received a financial boost while the pleasure factor is all abut gone. Traveling for pleasure has become an oxymoron. Wether traveling for business or pleasure the stress of long lines, no water, or hair products, packed seats, usually broken, and no food and God knows what will be next.
Is there any question that we are the loosers in this partiular war on terror? I'm all for doing the right thing to make us safe as a nation, but when it all shakes out and we regular Jane and Joe travelers are stuck with higher security as a way of life, with unpleasent "big Brother" now in charge of our travels ~ no more sweet service, now it is all business where they suspect first and then just continue suspecting.
The use of the now annoying and labor instensive methods of getting through to our planes is proof of us getting screwed. I believe that these procedures only stop the innocents and the idiots. True terrorists would have no problem getting around these poorly trained, poorly paided, and very serious, employees. I have seen this kind of zelot behavior on a visit to Istanbul and I found it beyound humiliting, they used thier bully power to accosst women and neither my husband nor I could prostest - and I had nothing to declare!!!! Guilty until proven innocent. Is that what we are willing to agree to?
I hope not! Rather than blindly giving away all our power and rights I think we should be more proactive outselves. For example has come kind of area where plane mates could meet prior to the screening process and then let the loners andf sun spects have to pass that intuitive search by normal people. The every one can mark a box if they have any reason to suspect a fellow passanger and air marshalls could follow through. It is not much but at least is is something out of the box that is not going to change our laws and dictate more and more of our choices in life.
There are so many ways to help this situation without depriving us of our freedoms and without allowing ourselves to be attacked or even unsafe, but it requires pro acition on the part of the citizens. Grass roots, just say no, that sort of think.
At any rate Jackie, Your amazinly articulate words have cause me to rent the move United 93 and try to watch without judgement. I will let you know :) Janice
Posted by janice mwc 2006 | September 12, 2006 1:55 AM
Posted on September 12, 2006 01:55