Unbearable

In Slate’s post-viewing podcast discussion of World Trade Center, critic Dana Stevens and Slate Senior Editor Bryan Curtis both seem confused about Oliver Stone’s movie. They both agree that it’s “effective,” but also agree that it has a very standardized, movie of the week feel to it. They note that the movie is “apolitical” in a somewhat similar fashion to Paul Greengrass’ earlier 9/11 film, United 93, but don’t seem to have a problem with Stone’s narrow viewpoint even though they found United 93's politcal evasions problematic. They seem aware of the way WTC focused on the most formulaic, Hollywoodesque moments of 9/11, and find this somewhat problematic, but then they go ahead and praise the film for its relatively happy ending. Curtis sums up his feelings about WTC by saying that, in comparison to United 93, Stone’s movie is simply more “bearable,” and that’s why he could recommend WTC but not United 93.

This strikes me as exactly wrong. That Stone’s movie is bearable is what is most problematic and most disturbing about it. The day that his movie depicts was unbearable, terrible, gut-wrenching—it’s a day that should never be made “bearable” by the tidy formulas of Hollywood. Greengrass’ movie, indeed, was unbearable, a horror to watch. I’m glad I saw it, but I never want to watch it again. But it was the dread that Greengrass conjured, the impossible, sickening futility of 9/11 that made the movie so effective, so powerful, and so utterly right. Stone’s movie, in its lame adherence to convention, trivializes a day that was not and never will be even remotely conventional. There are many words one might use to describe 9/11 or representations of it, but bearable should never be among them.