Kate and I went to see Thank You for Smoking yesterday (Short review: About as good an adaptation of the original book as you could hope for, and much more my thing than Kate's). The set of trailers we got was generally excruciating-- lots of film-festival material about quirky families being awful to one another. Granted, it's not really the audience you want to pitch X-Men III to, but I don't know if I've seen a more dispiriting block of trailers ever.
The most excruciating, of course, was the trailer for United 93, a lovingly detailed September 11th movie. And, apparently, based on poster in the lobby, not the only such movie in the works (and there's already been one tv movie, hasn't there?). Quite frankly, I'd rather stick forks in my eyes than see either of these.
I'm not sure how long I'd expect people to wait before putting out detailed re-enactments of those particular events, but my immediate reaction is that five years isn't really long enough. The thirty-ish years they waited between Pearl Harbor and Tora! Tora! Tora! (which seems to be the first Pearl Harbor movie to do a detailed re-creation of the actual attack) might be excessive, but the minimum acceptable values is certainly more than five.
And personally, I could live a long and happy life without ever seeing any of that footage again, let alone re-enactments of it. And don't even think about posting comments about how we should "never forget." There's no danger of that-- any time I want to ruin a morning, all I have to do is close my eyes, and I can see it frame by horrible frame.
I may be staying clear of the multiplex until these have run their course.
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But X-Men III is coming!
Which trailer did you see? The one I saw in the theater was mostly footage of relatives of the United 93 passengers saying they supported the movie and are glad it's being made. I'm like you, with no interest whatsoever in seeing the film, but I was impressed by the sensitivity of the trailer.
The movie's public premiere will be at the Tribeca Film Festival next week, and I saw DeNiro say that some people will be ready to see it, and some won't. If the movie is schlockingly horrible and jingoistic, he may regret showing it at Tribeca...
Incidentally, there is quite a good fiction piece entitled something like The Last Day of Mohammad Atta in the New Yorker this week. That was worth reading...
The trailer we saw was more of a stock movie trailer-- opening shots of people saying goodbye to their families, pilots running through their pre-flight checklists, then footage of the World Trade Center, then the hijacking.
There wasn't anything sensitive about it.
I was impressed by the sensitivity of the trailer.
Whereas I saw the same trailer and was struck by the observation that the producers spent the majority of the film's primary advertisement justifying having made the damn thing in the first place. Defensive much?
Not only that, but they do their justifying by claiming over and over that "the families want this story told", while only quoting a couple of actual family members. I don't mind the idea that what the families want should trump what J. Average Viewer wants, but my suspicion is that the majority of people directly affected by the hijacking wanted nothing to do with this grubby little flick.
I've seen the trailer shown in Polish cinema. It showed a computer flight control screen with the voice radio communication between the planes and flight control going in the background.
I think folks may be over-reacting just a tad bit. I've done a fair bit of digging into the background behind this movie.
The director got the permission of *every single family* who lost someone on Flight 93 before beginning the filming process. I've yet to see any statement from any of them that say that they are unhappy with how the flim has come together, and many of them (more than the handful who have been quoted) have stated their satisfaction.
The reviews I've read have stated that it doesn't attempt to be jingoistic; the first part of the movie sets the background, the last part of the movie concentrates on the people on Flight 93. One review I read commented that they hadn't stopped to realize how badly the various hijackings and crashes would have affected the ATC crews and came away from the movie with a new appreciation for what it took for them to watch the events going down, then get back to work.
I don't think this will be an easy movie to watch, and it's clear that it's drawn a lot of fire solely because of the material. In the end, though, I think there's going to be one good 9/11 movie and one bad one this summer -- and I think the one that *doesn't* have Oliver Stone attached is going to be the good one.
My wife and I plan on seeing the movie when it comes out, and I'll definitely blog about it.