When Too Soon Lasts Too Long

As I watched Jesus turn every cheek he had in the Passion of the Christ: How to Stop Narrative Momentum and Start Loving the Whip, one phrase dominated my thoughts-"Too soon." I mean, the man has been dead for approximately 2,000 years, but he's still very much alive in our hearts. Moreover, with liberal propaganda and alternative lifestyles ubiquitously tainting the sanctity of his legacy, it was untimely and morally reprehensible to depict the degradation of his body in such a violent fashion, as most of us are content to simply nibble on it every Sunday.

Okay, so I'm actually a very liberal Jew who finds the ideology of "family values" to be the most dangerous ploy since Communism, but that fact notwithstanding, the above rings true. We are an inherently cannibalistic species, as we feed upon our dead as a means of achieving both cultural and financial sustenance. The two are intertwined more often than not, as various histories are regurgitated for profit-our collective past spat down our throats like a bird to her young. We may be condemned to repeat history, but we choose to relive it, as the recapitulation of a fading memory can turn a nugget of truth into a source of inspiration in its arousal of our morbid curiosity (the power of which cannot be underestimated). Herodotus understood this communal need a few millennia ago, and at some point in the 20th century, Hollywood got it too.

I imagine that such a moment occurred in the years following Battleship Potemkin's domestic debut, as Sergei Eisenstein's film was among the first cinematic narratives to successfully obsess over a traumatic historical event. Cut to the recent past, and people are flocking to the box office to ensure that films like Titanic and Pearl Harbor are obscenely profitable in their exploitation of a tragic event. There was no controversy-despite the blatant revisionism, relatively few complained. So why, as I watched the trailer for Paul Greengrass' United 93 before a recent screening of Munich, was I surrounded by the world's most ironic shaking heads? How soon is too soon, and why is it always sooner for the movies?

The first answer is simpler than you think: never. It is never soon enough to accurately reflect upon a tragedy, particularly when such a reflection is channelled through a medium as widely accessible as mainstream cinema. While temporal distance is obviously conducive to proper meditation, had Gus Van Sant's Elephant been released on April 21st, 1999 rather than in the spring of 2003, the American populace would have been that much quicker to sidestep the Columbine shitstorm and ask the right questions. Unfortunately (logistics notwithstanding), such a timely release would have been made impossible by the religious right-too sensitive about lost (or unborn) American lives and woefully indifferent of those still being lived.

So before Bill O'Reilly tells you otherwise, I must assure you that Greengrass (responsible for the brilliant and respectful docudrama, Bloody Sunday), cannot possibly exploit the events of Sept. 11, 2001 more than they already have been. While American egocentricity might assume that this particular tragedy is of a more transcendent and infallible horridness than the various monstrosities filmmakers have turned their lenses upon in the past, voices pervasive voices have proven otherwise. The most egregious offender was 2004's Republican National Convention, which fought to be held in NYC as a means of shamelessly co-opting Sept. 11 to their cause, effectively inviting anyone with nobler intentions (i.e., the team behind Final Destination 3) to use the attacks at will.

But in an industry where Pearl Harbor is considered a torchbearer in this regard, it's no surprise that United 93 is fighting an uphill battle despite Greengrass' dedication to authenticity and the support of the victims' families. Hollywood isn't more profit-oriented than any other industry in the field of visual media, it's just more profit-able. Because a given medium is only afforded so much cultural capital, Hollywood has too often sacrificed its integrity, thus rendering our most effective means of recreating the past incompetent and insulting in the eyes of the world.

To that end, United 93 could be the film that films need. Rather than fortify the various filters that obscure our present understanding of Sept. 11, United 93 promises to cut through them by depicting our fall itself rather than our reaction to it. The flight was inexplicably delayed before take-off, and thus the passengers who presumably overtook their hijackers, who were told of the other hijackings via cell phone, were the first to be indoctrinated to the frightening world that has since been forced upon us all. As Greengrass himself explains on the film's Web site, those passengers flew above a world in transition, and only in their final moments can we find and reclaim what we're fighting for.

In A People's History of the United States, Howard Zinn wrote, "If history is to be creative, to anticipate a possible future without denying the past, it should, I believe, emphasize new possibilities by disclosing those hidden episodes of the past when, even if in brief flashes, people showed their ability to resist, to join together, occasionally to win." So, in resisting this controversy before it begins, I say we disclose this (not quite hidden) episode before our memories of Sept. 11 are engulfed by its consequences-before future movies take them away from us. Depending on how Greengrass pulls it off, it could be the most respectful thing we can do.