On September 11, 2001, terrorists used commercial airliners as weapons to attack America. Two hijacked planes were used to take down the Twin Towers, another was flown into the Pentagon. Terrorists had plans to use another 747 to hit either the White House or the U.S. Capital Building. The movie, “Flight 93” shows the true story of how forty brave passengers stopped another devastating attack. The director, Peter Markle, wanted the story of United 93 to never be forgotten, and he does so by pulling at the heartstrings of America with this true account of heroism.
The movie begins with shots of future passengers waking up and getting ready unaware of what will unfold later that day. It shows them saying goodbye to family as they leave for their flight. As they boarded the plane, names of the characters were shown on the tickets, letting the audience recognize familiar names from that flight. The director uses this to remind the viewers of the reality of the events portrayed. After everyone had boarded, the plane took off to its planned destination.
Switching to scenes of the passenger’s families, news broadcasts of the planes crashing into the World Trade Center were shown. At the same time up in the air, four hijackers revealed their true objective as they took control of the flight 93, stabbing passengers and killing the pilots. As the movie progresses, the passengers find out that this is a suicide mission. They unite with one another and decide to take back control of the plane. Tom Burnett’s famous words, “Let’s roll” are heard as the heroic group charges the cockpit to fight the terrorists.
The film included numerous details from the actual event. However, with so much information, the movie moves along at a relatively slow pace, especially compared to Hollywood’s action movies today, where there are always explosions and fist fights every few seconds. The facts were exactly what Markle wanted and he went to great lengths to acquire them. He used information from public records of flight 93 and its surrounding events. In the script, Markle used the exact words which passengers and their families said in phone conversations during the hijacking. Because Markle only had phone audio records to work with, he did his best to replicate the actions and emotions that were most probable to happen that day. The plot is slow to develop with the numerous character and family introductions in the beginning. This snail-like start seems to pay off as the movie continues. It’s hard to hold back tears when the final phone calls and good-byes are said between the passengers and their loved ones. Markle really played on the crowd’s emotions when each passenger said a final “I love you” before heading off to fight, as their spouse sat helplessly back at home.
None of the actors or actresses are famous, or known in other movies for important roles. I believe this helps the film, by taking the focus off key actors. Sadly, the cameraman’s and editors’ work wasn’t as professional as it should have been. In some of the scenes, they were chopped up too much, jumping from one view to the next much too quickly. This sudden scene switching shakes the viewer’s concentration, causing them to become somewhat removed from the movie for a moment. It takes a minute or two for the viewer to get their bearings straight again and be able to be pulled back into the movie.
The most important accomplishment of this film is in illustrating the true heroism shown by those people on flight 93. Markle did a fantastic job at showing how this event affected the families and friends of the passengers. After seeing the movie, family members of the victims wrote letters to Markle and his crew expressing how pleased they were with the film and its depiction of the incident.
Markle accomplished his objective by forever reminding us of the story of Flight 93. It will never be erased from our minds and hearts. By giving their lives, forty crewmembers and passengers saved countless others. Because of this movie, we will forever consider those people time honored heroes.
