World Trade Center (Widescreen Edition)

Average customer rating: 3.5

An Oliver Stone piece of tripe
Good Choice
Oliver Stone is just out for your money, not the truth
Great move but sad
Overly Long, But Still Emotional

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World Trade Center (Widescreen Edition)
Starring: Nicolas Cage , Maria Bello , Connor Paolo , Anthony Piccininni , and Alexa Gerasimovich
Director: Oliver Stone
Manufacturer: Paramount
Product Group: DVD
Binding: DVD
ASIN: B000JLTRKE
2006-12-12

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Stone, Oliver

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Regardless of whether it was "too early" in 2006 to dramatize the events of September 11th, 2001, World Trade Center succeeds as a tribute to the courage and sacrifice of those who served at "ground zero" in the wake of terrorist attacks on the WTC's twin towers in New York City. Removed from the politics of war and terrorism (yet still, like all films, inherently political in expressing its point of view), Oliver Stone's potent drama focuses on the nightmarish ordeal, and subsequent rescue, of Port Authority policemen John McLoughlin (Nicolas Cage) and Will Jimeno (Michael Peña), who were buried deeply within the rubble of the WTC after the twin towers collapsed. Granted, it's only the film's historical context that distinguishes it from any other dramatic rescue story, but in focusing on the goodness of humanity in response to the evil of terrorists who remain unnamed and off-screen, Stone and first-time screenwriter Andrea Berloff create an emotional context as powerful as anything Stone has directed since Platoon. Even as he resorts to some questionable tactics typically lacking in subtlety, Stone refrains from much of the blunt-force filmmaking that has made him a critical punching bag, rising to this challenging occasion with a heartfelt and deeply American portrait of unity - personal, familial, and national. Flaws and all, World Trade Center serves an honorable purpose, reminding us all that for those fleeting days in September 2001, America showed its best face to a sympathetic world. --Jeff Shannon

Description

"World Trade Center is a film about heroism and the best in all of us," raves Good Morning America's Joel Siegel. Academy Award winner, Nicolas Cage stars in the unforgettable true story of the courageous rescue and survival of two Port Authority policemen who were trapped in the rubble on September 11, 2001 after they volunteered to go in and help. Academy Award winning director, Oliver Stone reveals an intimate look at the events of the day as seen through the eyes of the survivors, their families and their rescuers

Customer Reviews:

An Oliver Stone piece of tripe.......2007-06-10

If you want to see a 9/11 movie see United 93. WTC is a terrible farce, using cheap Hollywood methods to try to manipulate your emotions as best as possible (ie juxtapose suffering of trapped firemen ((in extreme close up)) with flashbacks to happy days with their family - and don't forget the violins). Does an interesting drama unfold? Of course it does, it would be almost impossible not to create a powerful piece of cinema in the dramatic sense based on THAT day, but Oliver Stone shows almost no sensitivity to the subject matter, attacking it with Hollywood gusto and going for the audiences heartstrings almost from the first minute, focussing for the most part on two buried fireman who were among the 20 survivors from under the rubble of the WTC, the film simply enforces the rather obvious fact that those guys went through their own private hell that day - for me it was really nothing more than emotional porn latching onto a 'ready-made' narrative. If you have your doubts about this film then it's best avoided.

Good Choice.......2007-06-01

Excellent movie. Fast Shipping. Very happy with this purchase. Excellent movie to add to your collection.

Oliver Stone is just out for your money, not the truth.......2007-05-31

Oliver Stone is a movie maker, his bottom line isn't to tell us the truth , its to make as much money as he can. September 11th, being so close to all of our hearts and souls, and it being so soon after the fact, Is a hard story to tell especially in regards to the survivors and victims. Stone did not choose to tell this story, in all its heroism and individual sacrifice, in the light of truth. Instead he decided to bend and twist these men's rescue and the rescuers stories to his "bottom line" agenda. In the movie NYPD officer Scott Strauss is the man who crawls through hell to get to John and Will, in real life it was Chuck Sereika. Chuck had absolutely NO training in search and rescue and extrication, He was a paramedic who thought for sure he was crawling to his own death. In interviews with Chuck after viewing the movie said "the facts are so distorted that he didn't recognize what he was seeing as what he lived through" A journalist who was at ground zero and did first hand interviews of both the rescuers and Will and John at the hospital asked the filmmakers if they wanted his input, and was declined. Oliver Stone chose to focus on the men trapped, flashbacks, family grief instead of on the true life harrowing story of the rescuers and their unbelievable acts.
Stone missed many real facts that should have been put into the movie, and he added some that weren't necessary
1) Karnes, the man who dons his marine garb and sneaks onto ground zero, did not spout religious phrases to passerby's. He refused to be any part of the film.
2) The Other marine who shows up to help Karnes was a black guy, not a white guy
3) They completely left out a firefighter named Tommy Asher, officer Richard Doeler, and John Busching former detective now paramedic in new york. ALL of those men were VITAL to the rescue effort!! Doeler literally DUG out John with his bare hands, with no oxygen tank. It was Doerler, along with two FDNY firefighters, who finally pulled McLaughlin to safety after three hours of digging. In the movie, a team made up solely of firemen extricates McLaughlin. In real life, Doerler came in to relieve many other rescue workers who had been digging for about five hours and working sometimes in 20-minute shifts as the conditions were too difficult to withstand any longer amount of time. Doerler fashioned scoops out of metal scraps, as his usual hand shovel wouldn't fit at first. But none of these dramatic details come through in the movie. Doerler, like Strauss and Sereika before him, had to straddle the trapped officer's body in order to fit in the narrow space, balancing himself on his right arm and reaching out with his left to pull out the mashed concrete and twisted metal bits--a task made more difficult by the fact that he is right-handed. he says that the filmmakers never called him once to hear his story firsthand. Doerler said he hoped his character would be included, not for his own credit but so that the world would know what the Nassau County Emergency Service Unit did that day
4) The wife of Dominick Pezzulo, the NYPD officer who died along side John and Will is outraged at the filmmakers saying "my thing is, this man died for you, how could you do this to this family?" Obviously scarred enough by his death, but also scarred again by the onscreen death as well, and not in a true light.

Most people will watch this movie and take it as the truth, for how could someone make a movie about Sept 11 and leave out crucial, and important details, especially to tell a tale of "heroism and perseverance"?. Clearly it's because the filmmakers didn't care about the people who were really involved, they were out to fill their pockets. Don't buy this movie, don't watch it. Instead I would recommend, if you are curious about the truth of that day, to watch "9/11 The filmmakers commemorative addition" which is footage shot on that very day of the events unfolding and the heroism of the firefighters and NYPD involved

Great move but sad.......2007-05-16

I love the move. But it hurt alot to see it. I'm from NYC and lose some friends. But your CD was great and in good condition. Thank you

Overly Long, But Still Emotional.......2007-05-14

I agree with many other reviewers that the movie is too long. At just over two hours, the same film could have been made in about 90 minutes. However, I disagree that there was no "emotion" in this film.

Many have said they want the "real" story of the World Trade Center. They want to see jets exploding into buidings, they want to see people jumping to their deaths from sixty stories up, they want to see the towers collapsing as thousands of people scream in horror.

Me? I already saw that story, on the news the day of 9/11 and the weeks that followed. I don't need to see it again.

What WORLD TRADE CENTER is is a story of courage, strength, and the desire to help your fellow man. What those two Port Authority policemen went through is a tribute to everyone who died on 9/11. The spirit of working together, of working to stay alive, is one we can all do well to listen to.

Sure, the movie could have been shorter. Yes, it's "just" about two men who spent hours trapped under the rubble of a collapsed tower. Yes, there are scenes of their "bawling" wives. There is also the news that these officers survived, endured unimaginable pain through countless operations, and emerged as heroes on a day that surely needed them.

That was good enough for me.

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