Universal Will Not Pull 'United 93' Trailer, Despite Criticism

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

LOS ANGELES, April 3 — Universal Studios said on Monday that it would stick with plans to show an adrenaline-pumping trailer for "United 93," its forthcoming thriller about the passenger revolt on one of the planes hijacked on 9/11, despite qualms from some moviegoers and families of 9/11 victims.

Adam Fogelson, Universal's president of marketing, said the trailer, which was pulled from AMC Loews Lincoln Square 12 Theater in Manhattan on Saturday after complaints from patrons, would be shown only before R-rated movies or "grown-up" PG-13 ones. He said the trailer was created to give a candid sense of the film itself, which opens at the end of the month


"The film is not sanitized or softened, it's an honest and real look" at the events on United Airlines Flight 93, Mr. Fogelson said. "If I sanitized the trailer beyond what's there, am I suggesting that the experience will be less real than what the movie itself is? We as a company feel comfortable that it is a responsible and fair way to show what's coming."

The studio's challenge — how to promote a film about the tragedy without seeming to exploit it — is likely to surface repeatedly in coming months, as a cluster of movies that touch on the events of 9/11 begins to surface.

MKJ

[Tiggeroshii]

1. Anybody know when Oliver Stone's 9-11 movie's

..coming out?

I heard he was making one focusing on the possible conspiracy surrounding the whole thing. Anybody know anything about it?

[Lautremont]

5. His movie is about the last firemen to escape from the towers,

and doesn't sound terribly big-picture w/r/t exposing any conspiracies.

[Tiggeroshii]

8. gotcha

I looked it up a little more after I posted this. You're right. I guess once I heard he was directing a 911 movie, I immediately assumed it had something to do with conspiracy(much like JFK was). However, that may be premature now to some extent -I don't know.

[Terran1212]

9. Either way, I definitely want to see it

Stone is a great director who knows the American experience and human experience very well. He'll do it all justice!

[Tiggeroshii]

11. Likewise! n/t

[madaboutharry]

2. This reminds me of the controversy

surrounding "Schindler's List." Spielberg rightfully stood by his guns and would sanitize the film. I am also reminded of school boards that wanted to ban "The Diary of Anne Frank" because, they claimed, it was too depressing. The test as to whether this film is honest is if we see George Bush sitting in a classroom listening to "The Pet Goat" while hijacked plans slam into buildings in New York.

[Ignis]

31. LOL, that would be delightful!

I would love to see the Dumbya-Goat image in every single one of these 911 movies, but I think it's doubtful we'll see it anywhere more mainstream than in Michael Moore's films.

I think that scene would make a brilliant commercial to be run between now and 2008. :)

[ClintonTyree]

3. ALLEGED passenger revolt..........

no one knows for sure and I'm convinced the entire story surrounding that event is bogus. I think a LOT of what we're told about what happened that day is bogus. I'm not going to waste my money seeing it passed off as fact.

[Ian David]

6. I think they made-up part where Jodi Foster's child is lost on the plane..

and where they lower a guy from a helicopter to try and land the plane.

[Ian David]

4. Leslie Nielsen walks into the cockpit and tells the terrorists...

"I just wanted to tell you both good luck. We're all counting on you."

I thought that was pretty tasteless.

[ClintonTyree]

7. Haha.........

if it stars Leslie Nielson then I may go see it! ;)

[regnaD kciN]

12. Just as long as we don't get a movie about the World Trade Center...

...starring Leonardo DiCaprio and Kate Winslett. :eyes:

[sweetheart]

10. oh THAT film! I saw that!

It starts with a blast,
hot bits of fuselage and rocket casing,
thunderous rush as the fighter blew past,
AAMRAAM, faithful sidewinder or the new one phasing.
And the film took two hours to show in slow mo,
the dissintegration of the lives bush was taking,
as they, bit by bit, came apart time ago,
in a violent explosion, air force jets evacuating.

Then as the heroes die in midair life embracing,
their heroic last gestures in exploding flames,
the great bullshit storm of moviedom's future irritating,
stereotype of exploding bodies as mythical heros stormed; hyjakked videogame.
Somewhere in a PA field, buried ultra deep,
lies the truth of that fell deed, killing secret keep.

[Bhaisahab]

21. And then another day

Another time, another hour
somebody will disable
all defences, all ramparts
all the moats and all the gates
and
somebody will enable
a new atrocity on unsuspecting plebians
televised live, televised wide
allowing the horror to settle
allowing the vomit to accumulate
and then will spill
an appropriate military response
that will kill other
unsuspecting plebians
and lo and behold
Universal will have a new film
on the floor

[sweetheart]

23. no observer, no entertained

As we sit back and entertain,
those verbal prognostications argued of youth,
some persons believe it be in vain,
to frame ourselves as needing to be told truth.
om vedically were the wisdom then,
arisen in chakra spine of a few empower,
enlighten magnets to keep them in heaven,
lest they loose the plot and kill the flower.

Hidden in every human cluster, apparently similar,
the dissimilar past life DNA of humanity resides,
a complex pscyhic interrelationship chaotic dissimilar,
Don't worry, for now, "the dude abides".
The failure of democracy to account or aware,
incarnate forces dark, but balanced out there.

[Jersey Ginny]

13. This is too soon for me. It is still too painful.

I don't want to watch a big screen dramatized version of that horrible day. Just my 2 cents.

[Catchawave]

14. Olbermann played the trailer tonight.....

maybe liveoak captured it? It was very chilling/disturbing, in those few moments I couldn't take my eyes off the t.v.....even though I really wanted to :cry:

[anotherdrew]

15. the whole film is social engineering. they shot that plane to bits in air.

a major motion picture without a happy ending? unheard of, who's going to go see this LIE? Sure as hell not me.

[Pastiche423]

16. From what I have heard about it

It's pure "Let's roll" propaganda. If it is, I hope the trailer does get pulled.

I'm so f'ing sick of lies!

[Robb]

17. "Every good American should see this film!"

Wait for it. :D

"Why do you hate America?!?"

[Beausoir]

18. I saw the trailer. It did nothing for me.

The trailer did nothing for me. I've heard that people were walking out and protesting the trailer, with tears in their eyes.

I didn't move me at all.

And for Jeffrey Lyons, tonight on Olberman, to claim that there is some magical date when it will be "acceptable" to hold a public debate about 9-11 struck me as ridiculous.

What would that date be? George Bush uses 9-11 for his own personal and political gain every single day of his life. But we, the common people aren't supposed to discuss it?

[adigal]

29. My husband was a NYC firefighter who was working 9/11

and I thought he was dead all day, so the trailer gave me the chills and brought tears to my eyes.

But I do not have any right to tell any movie maker what he/she can make movies about. If no one goes to see it, then no more movies will be made about 9/11. If it is a big hit, expect many more.

It is all about $$. I personally do not think I could go see it. I was too affected by that day.

[knitter4democracy]

19. I really don't want to see that.

I don't think we know what happened, as the stories we got were just amazingly perfect for propaganda, and I don't think a movie is the way to honor those who died.

[BleedingHeartPatriot]

20. I have such mixed feelings...on the one hand, the real stories of 9/11

should be kept front and center.

By real, i mean, the painful impact on American citizens, especially those directly affected. gwb has co-opted the phrase "September 11th" and repeated it so much it's starting to lose its emotional punch.

It needs to be front and center when discussing the failure of this administration to address the 9/11 Commission's report.

It needs to be front and center for any credible discussion of MIHOP or LIHOP to resonate with the average American.

Yet, I'm concerned about two things...exploitation and propaganda. Both of which seem plausible with this movie.

:shrug: I guess I'm of the opinion that the movie should be released and let it play out as it will. MKJ

[Tracer]

22. This story is overdone.

There already have been TWO, count 'em, TWO made-for-television movies about Flight 93.

And now we need a THIRD movie?

I don't think so.

[Mika]

24. Looks like Rove's post 911 trip to "Hollywood" is bearing fruit.

1984
Chapter 9
http://www.online-literature.com/orwell/1984/17/

On the sixth day of Hate Week, after the processions, the speeches, the shouting, the singing, the banners, the posters, the films, the waxworks, the rolling of drums and squealing of trumpets, the tramp of marching feet, the grinding of the caterpillars of tanks, the roar of massed planes, the booming of guns -- after six days of this, when the great orgasm was quivering to its climax and the general hatred of Eurasia had boiled up into such delirium that if the crowd could have got their hands on the 2,000 Eurasian war-criminals who were to be publicly hanged on the last day of the proceedings, they would unquestionably have torn them to pieces -- at just this moment it had been announced that Oceania was not after all at war with Eurasia. Oceania was at war with Eastasia. Eurasia was an ally.

There was, of course, no admission that any change had taken place. Merely it became known, with extreme suddenness and everywhere at once, that Eastasia and not Eurasia was the enemy. Winston was taking part in a demonstration in one of the central London squares at the moment when it happened. It was night, and the white faces and the scarlet banners were luridly floodlit. The square was packed with several thousand people, including a block of about a thousand schoolchildren in the uniform of the Spies. On a scarlet-draped platform an orator of the Inner Party, a small lean man with disproportionately long arms and a large bald skull over which a few lank locks straggled, was haranguing the crowd. A little Rumpelstiltskin figure, contorted with hatred, he gripped the neck of the microphone with one hand while the other, enormous at the end of a bony arm, clawed the air menacingly above his head. His voice, made metallic by the amplifiers, boomed forth an endless catalogue of atrocities, massacres, deportations, lootings, rapings, torture of prisoners, bombing of civilians, lying propaganda, unjust aggressions, broken treaties. It was almost impossible to listen to him without being first convinced and then maddened. At every few moments the fury of the crowd boiled over and the voice of the speaker was drowned by a wild beast-like roaring that rose uncontrollably from thousands of throats. The most savage yells of all came from the schoolchildren. The speech had been proceeding for perhaps twenty minutes when a messenger hurried on to the platform and a scrap of paper was slipped into the speaker's hand. He unrolled and read it without pausing in his speech. Nothing altered in his voice or manner, or in the content of what he was saying, but suddenly the names were different. Without words said, a wave of understanding rippled through the crowd. Oceania was at war with Eastasia!

[lovuian]

25. This is one movie I'm going to miss...

I saw the trailer and I believe in LIHop and I don't think anybody knows what happen on 93

[Kailassa]

26. I hope the film is good fiction.

Because there is too much bad fiction around already.

[newspeak]

27. Not going to waste my money

seeing this one. However, I do have a good movie plot. A firefighter on an oxygen machine with flash backs to that day on 9/11. Scenes through his eyes, while he attempts to rescue people, and now because of the airborne contamination that our government said was safe, he is left broken with ill health and painful memories. Maybe if people viewed a movie like that, they'd see that there are still victims from that day.

[hopein08]

28. Have the families of the Flight 93 passengers actually approved any of...

the movies that have been made about the flight? And where did, say Universal, get the minute details? I know a lot of it has been made public and maybe I'm just to cynical, but I smell propaganda on this big time.

But my biggest issue with the movies is what the families say about them.

[sendero]

30. "The film is not sanitized or softened, it's an honest and real look"

If it doesn't end with 93 being shot down, it is not honest and it is not real.