Critic's Grade: A

Well done. Well done. With a cast of everyday actors playing the roles of everyday people, they gave a convincing portrayal of those who not only died on September 11, but those who lived through it too. United 93 shows Ben Sliney (portraying himself) on the first day of his promotion to command the FAA air traffic control room. Little did he know it would be the worst day of his life. This movie is riveting. It shows a unique view into the lives of air traffic administrators and how they monitor planes on a daily basis. The shock and anguish they experienced that day was dumbfounding. The FAA was clueless, the military was defenseless, the local towers in Boston, NY, Washington and Cleveland were powerless, and the President was speechless.(inconspicuously absent from this film). The painful part was watching the passengers. You felt bad for the guy who barely made the flight, wishing the plane left without him. You get angry when you find out the bomb wasn't a bomb and that all they had were boxcutters. You show no remorse to the pilot hijacker who apparantly had second thoughts or cold feet about the whole thing. You get a lump in your throat when they show the second plane hit the World Trade Center. You get emotional when the passangers start to use the air phones to call home and say goodbye. You get fired up when they decide to charge the cockpit and re-take the plane, hoping somehow that the movie itself would actually change history. And you get shocked when the abrupt ending, although physically painless, must have been just as abrupt in real life. Like I said, well done.....well done.

wingnut

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