Customer Reviews

World Trade Center

5 star:		(63)
4 star:		(36)
3 star:		(18)
2 star:		(14)
1 star:		(24)

 

 

I remember Sep 11 like this: I was visiting in Shanghai, came to my hotel room in the evening, not so late, turned on CNN as usual, and saw a plane fly into one of the towers. It took me quite some time to understand what I had just seen. I called my wife and asked her to turn on TV at home. She had not heard yet.
I never felt more American than on that day.
I am German, by the way.
When I heard that Oliver Stone was making a movie about this, I could not believe it. Too early, too monumental, too emotionally loaded, too ideologically simple. This could only become a bad film.
It hasn't. It is a simple story about confusion and heroism and survival. Well done.
You never see a plane fly into anything. You only hear people talk about it, but there are also some who don't believe it. It shows you the segmented vision of people who are near the center. People watching TV in Shanghai probably knew more of what actually happened right at the time than those caught in the middle of it.
Stone stays away from explicit interpretation, he leaves that to the spectator.

Oliver Stone has made a very compelling and respectful portrayal
of one of the most inspiring stories of survival in our time.
I've seen a lot of movies in my life and this one is one of the few
that have stayed with me for days after seeing it. I was engaged from
beginning to end. World Trade Center also feels like one of Stone's
earlier films like Salvador or Platoon.Very raw.
There are a few minor flaws. The only complaint I have is the portrayal
of Staff Sargeant Karnes. It simply stands out too much in comparison
to the natural portrayal of the rest of the characters.
This is still a good film and an important film. Anybody who snubs
Stone for not making the conspiracy film they expect from him need to
get over it and see this. If he wanted to make a conspiracy film he
would have. He wanted to spread some hope. How could anyone have a problem with that? Thank you,Oliver!

The main part of the story is about two NYC police officers who are trapped in ruble and are rescued. It would not do justice for the 9-11 victims to tell every story of everybody that died or survived on that day. That is probably 6000 individual stories (survivors and people who died). All of their stories deserved to be told, and hopefully somebody somewhere is creating a website or a book to do just that. Some of them would be interesting enough to be made in a movie, but most likely they would better served by being made into a book that can be read one story at a time without any time boundness and dramatization that are required of movies.

As for this movie, it did the job is was designed to do. Is it a movie I would watch over and over again? No. Is it a movie I would recommend to others to see? Yes.

As for me, I went into the movie without having been exposed to the news coverage of the events day in and day out. I did not know how I would react seeing the dramatization of the "evils" of that day. I was glad that the movie did not focus on the dramatization of the airplanes crashing into the WTC. It was just shown on a TV in the background. I am also glad that it had zero coverage of the Muslims preparing for the day or whatever. They do not deserve the film time.

The movie told the story that it was designed to tell, and it did it very well. I feel sorry for the reviewers who are so exposed to hollywood dramatization that they cannot handle or accept true reality. The movie is the truth, not TV hollywood.

Oh, the marine person was not just thrown in. He was the man who found them, and the film did a very good job of showing his personality and his dedication to his task. Everyone portrayed in that film is a real life hero, not a hollywood actor. They deserved to be treated as such.

Nicholas Cage and Michael Pena star as two New York City Port Authority police officers in this magnificent film by Oliver Stone which describes one of the darkest days in the history of the United States: September 11, 2001.

Cage stars as Sgt. John McLoughlin, and Pena stars as officer Will Jimeno. These two men, along with a crew of other officers, entered into the stricken World Trade Center shortly after the brutal terrorist attacks. Their job was to go up inside the tower and assist with rescue efforts. However, shortly after entering the buildings, the collapse began. The officers immediately dove for an elevator shaft; supposedly one of the strongest places in the building. Despite their quick thinking, McLoughlin, Jimeno, and the rest of the officers are buried under tons of concrete and debris. McLoughlin and Jimeno are the only survivors.

Meanwhile, Jimeno's wife Allison (Maggie Gyllenhaal) is 5 months' pregnant with a new baby daughter, and McLoughlin's wife Donna (Maria Bello) is busy making plans for her son J.J.'s birthday party. Both see the terrorist attacks on television and immediately fear for their husbands' safety. The two families begin a consant vigil while waiting to hear any news about the well-being of their husbands.

While buried in the rubble, Jimeno and McLoughlin try to do anything they can to stay awake and keep each other alive. Fearing internal injuries, neither man wants to fall asleep. They keep each other awake by talking about their families and their lives as police officers. A deep bond forms between the two, and neither wants to be rescued without the other.

Efforts to find survivors have begun, spearheaded by members of the United States Marines, along with the New York City Fire and Police Department. One member of the Marine unit is Sgt. Dave Karnes (Michael Shannon). A former member of the Marines, Karnes has left his regular accounting job to come to New York to assist with rescue efforts. He, along with another rescuer, hears Jimeno banging on a pipe. Soon, Karnes has located the two fallen officers, and reinforcements are called in to get them out. The two men are soon pulled to safety and taken to a local hospital.

Only twenty survivors were pulled from the wreckage of the World Trade Center. McLoughlin and Jimeno endured more than most people possibly could, and they survived to tell about it. Both endured several surgeries on their road to recovery, but something more came out of this ordeal; a life-long bond and friendship between two officers who were merely doing their jobs.

This is a truly moving and magnificent film. Nicholas Cage gives one of the finest performances of his career as Sgt. McLoughlin, while Michael Pena is excellent as officer Jimeno. Oliver Stone's directing is first-rate, and he tells the story of 9-11 in a factual, yet sensitive and tasteful manner.

I give this tremendous film my highest recommendation. Watch and see how two heroic police officers risked their own lives to save the lives of strangers and ended up surviving their own personal hardships. If you have a dry eye after watching this movie, then something's wrong.

I overcame my own intentions NOT to watch this film. We lived this tragedy such a short while ago in all the terror, reality, horror, and stunned sorrow, it seems we are imposing fiction on reality and watching watered-down films of the tragic realities, I thought perhaps to make the feelings less painful.

I decided to watch this film and 'United 93' because I think the victims they portray and their families deserve our respect and honor. In both instances, the families gave their blessing, even their urging, for the films to be made.

Now I find that reading these reviews is even more painful than watching the films.

That we, the American people, could characterize the words of men in imminent danger of dying under tons of rubble due to circumstances faced while serving their fellowman as 'idle chit chat' makes me gasp at our heartlessness and our crass insensitivity to the real heroes and their families.

A reviewer decrying the lack of a 'goosebump factor' in a film portraying one infinitesimal personal portion of an event that changed individual's lives and the lives of Americans as a population to an amazingly huge degree, makes me wonder about the psyche of our humanity and the lack of understanding about and compassion for the pain of our fellow citizens.

That 'no-action' could be a phrase used when describing 'pretty-close-to-reality' depictions of personal sacrifice and tragedy as two men face death buried beneath the ruins of two of American's largest buildings caused me to question the lack of empathy we feel for those around us.

Lastly, I question how anyone who lived through the events of 09-11 aired into our homes and burned into our psyche in such tragic minute detail that millions who didn't personally know even one individual involved in this horrific event have had their lives changed forever, could feel 'boredom' while glimpsing such intimate details of two heroic survivors.

There may have been more in the following reviews that I could have been saddened by, but my surprise and revulsion in reading just the few I did read caused me to have to stop and take a deep breath and bow my head in shame for so many of the inhabitants of this great nation.

While my reason for finally watching this film may be difficult for some to understand, it cannot possibly be as hard to accept or rationalize as patrons who watched it for 'action', 'goose bumps', 'deep conversations', or to relieve 'boredom' when we all know the tragic details of the true circumstances being depicted. Heaven help us as individuals and America as a whole.

This movie was a very gripping and moving film that is to be commended for telling the story of two men who faced 9-11 and lived to talk about it.

This movie does not get involved at all in the politics or the newly emerging and highly inventive conspiracy theories that have since come about in regards to 9-11.

It is about two men, police officers, who get trapped in the collapsed buildings while in the process of trying to help evacuate the towers. You go through their struggles and those of their families throughout the movie. I am really impressed with Oliver Stone's work and the film he produced when he stuck to the actual story of what happened.

To those that say this movie is not moving I wonder why every single person I saw in the theater were wiping tears from their eyes at the end. I saw this in Bangkok and know that the audience had very few Americans (a low percentage have passports and few use them).

"There are risks to and costs to a program of action, but they are far less than the long-range risks and costs of comfortable inaction." JFK

That 20 people would survive the collapse of the World Trade Towers and be pulled out alive from under those tons of debris. That a former Marine would, on-his-own, feel compelled to take himself to ground zero to search for survivors among the smoldering, still-dangerous, ruins that night. That two first-responders, Port Authority Policeman, would be found by that same Marine (and another self-appointed volunteer) as their survival was nearing failure. That Oliver Stone would make a movie about these two policeman, their ordeal and that of their families, as a microcosm of the terror and tragedy of that day, and do so with reverence and respect. That his film would be a testament to virtues some of us still prize, those of courage and honor and duty--not only that of John McLoughlin and Willy Jimeno, the trapped policeman, but also of those who dared to go into that burning, unstable and perilous wreckage to bring them out.

This film celebrates those simple virtues-courage, honor, duty, family- and I think Oliver Stone believes them important enough that he set aside political opinion to present them in a straightforward manner. If you believe this is only the stuff of cheap Hollywood theatrics, well, that's sad. Real guts were plentiful on that day and those following, and I believe that was honestly portrayed here in focusing on the miraculous true story of these two men.

All the performances are heartfelt and equally good. I was not bored. I knew going in that this was a story of survival, but the details were gripping and unbelievable nontheless. I thought Stone and his production caught the immensity of ground zero in deft touches: the roar of the burning buildings amid the falling debris, the ghastly sound of the impact of bodies, the simple enormity of the structures and the dust and confusion, the look of shocked and stunned people everywhere. It gave a sense of the size of the disaster. The following story would be difficult to tell, with two of the main leads immoblized in a crushed building, but I thought the editing back and forth from the men to the families worked.

Credit to all involved, this was a film I thought I might not like, but I went with it all the way. Nicely done by Stone and company. And all respect and good wishes to the real men and their families, and to all those who served that day, and serve now.

There will alway be discussions of whether or not it's a proper time to show a real disaster in media most known for fiction. Whether we admit it or not, there are fears that the event will be trivialized. Worse yet, we're always afraid of the emotions that come along with such treatments and compare the works with how we remember the real event.

When I heard that Oliver Stone was directing a "big-view" story of 9/11 seen through the eyes of two real survivors and the people of New York, I was more than a little afraid. I was, in fact, terrified. Take nothing away from Stone in his successes - he's a great storyteller and can deliver powerful emotional stories - but we also know he has a tendancy to demonstrate his contempt and suspicion of goverment, as well as the habit of belaboring points to death. I remember Denis Leary once making the comment in "No Cure For Cancer" about his take on "The Doors" - "do we need a three-hour movie on Jim Morrison?" He was right - we didn't.

But here was the surprise - Stone did this tale well.

It's a story rich in detail and filled with real-life heroes. Nic Cage leads the rest of a stellar cast to bring a painfully personal account of survival in a context of a nation under attack. New York, as well as Washington, Pennsylvania, even my own Boston, were different places before the attacks, and through Stone's attention to detail, we see the day it all happened with crystal clarity. "World Trade Center" reminded me of how it was before and how much we have changed as a people. Mostly because we see that day as it was. We were spectators, true, but we were living it, praying in it, watching the ruins of the Towers with a desperate hope for happy news while getting precious little of it. The survial of two heroic New York City cops, trapped beneath the rubble of a symbol, gave us some when we needed it the most.

"World Trade Center" isn't an easy film to watch precisely because it kicks up old emotions. Thus, it will NOT be to everyone's taste, and it will leave some empty. Yet, when we hold it up to "United 93," another gripping account of that day from a very different perspective, we see what we need to see - a nation attacked, a people wounded to the core, the spirit to carry on, and a people (despite its government - sorry, had to say it) willing to do what had to be done in order to bring some goodness out of horror.

When Oliver Stone makes movies of historical value, he tends to exagerate the facts (i.e. JFK, Salvador, Midnight Express). In this film, he completely stays out of delivering negative propaganda on who was responsible and focuses on the ordeal and rescue of Port Authority policemen John McLoughlin (Nicolas Cage) and Will Jimeno (Michael Peña). The result is a movie that all viewers would be proud of. The film was made with courage and sympathy to the victims. Some viewers may be put off by the intensity of the subject matter, due to the film being too soon to watch. This film is very much needed in this day and age in hopes that the events of September 11th, 2001 are never forgotten.

This movie is exellent but it is probably not how you think it is going to be.......

My boyfriend was disappointed that it did not tell a lot about the Trade Center and the attack but I really enjoyed the movie.....

This movie is based around three men that get trapped under the Trade Center as they went on duty as fire fighters trying to rescue people from the tower. These men get trapped and buried under the tower and rubbel but can communicate with each other, one guy dies and the other two men live and struggle for survival as they barely have oxygen. Both families are very worried and concerned that they have not heard from there husbands and start to lose hope after a long while of waiting. There are many flashbacks of these two men's families and kids before the attack on the World Trade Center and then it goes back to the present setting of there wives being worried again and also the men not knowing if they will ever see there wife again. The movie gives a good message of all of the people that died fighting to save the lives of others on the attack of the World Trade Center and also a message of the volunteers that helped to find people that were burried under the World Trade Center! These men lived because of the many people that never gave up searching for them and all of the people that were burried.

This movie was very very sad but the men make it out alive!! This will definitely make you realize how much you love and and care about your family (husbands, wives, and children) and will make you thank God that you are still blessed with your family. This is definitely a must see movie!