Memories of 9/11 are often dominated by images of a burning World Trade Center, but in United 93 British writer/director Paul Greengrass remembers events over Pennsylvania when airline passengers fought back. Inevitably this is an "emotionally raw" viewing experience, coming just five years after the attacks - perhaps too soon for some moviegoers, but many did venture to see it.

Reliving The Nightmare

"You don't ask until you think it is the right time," says Greengrass on his decision to make the film. "And that right time, I thought, was now." Bereaved family members aren't always in agreement, but they are forthcoming about their efforts to come to terms with it in a moving hour-long documentary. "Physically and mentally it's hard to take," says one man, but as the film rolls on, his doubts slowly give way. Assisting Greengrass and his actors becomes a sort of catharsis for everyone involved. It is an absorbing documentary but sometimes difficult to watch, like a sequence where actress Lorna Dallas visits the mother and sister of the passenger she is playing. Together they watch a home video of Linda Gronlund who was two days from celebrating her birthday when she was killed. All of their journeys culminate with a private screening of the film hosted by Greengrass.

Capturing The Moment

Being both the writer and director of the film, Greengrass offers a wealth of insights in his commentary. He talks about wanting to reflect a basic conflict of "modernity and medievalism", the latter represented by the Muslim fanatics who, he says, "didn't just hijack a plane" but also "hijacked a religion". In terms of the achieving that visceral, documentary style he explains that he used a two-camera set-up with two differently inclined cameramen. Their distinct styles married together to give the film an even more unsettling quality. On top of that the decision to cast a mixture of experienced actors and non-professionals and using long takes ("sometimes as long as an hour") heightened the sense of immediacy. "The actors stop acting," says Greengrass, "And the non-actors start to act and they meet somewhere in the middle and you get this sense of inner-reality."

Unfortunately we're not afforded direct behind-the-scenes access to see Greengrass at work, but given the already difficult conditions of filming, it's not surprising. In any case this DVD remains a fascinating and sobering tribute to those who perished aboard United 93. They are individually remembered in a series of detailed biographies to complete the special features menu.

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