The inevitable flood of 9/11-based docudramas starts this week with A&E's Flight 93 (January 30, 9 p.m.), not to be confused with the theatrical film Flight 93 that will be released in April. Like the upcoming feature film, this Flight 93 is based on documented accounts of the events that transpired aboard the United Airlines flight that crashed in a Pennsylvania field on the morning of September 11, 2001. Passengers were able to make phone calls to loved ones before banding together to combat the hijackers and force the plane down away from its intended target.
Of all the potential stories to come out of that day, the account of Flight 93 is both the most cinematic and the most immediately heart-wrenching. The clear, linear narrative of the events aboard the plane has the quality of a big-screen thriller, and even the tragic ending is leavened by hope and the human spirit. If nothing else, Flight 93 is an extraordinarily effective tearjerker. Watching buildings catch on fire and crumble is awe-inspiring in an abstract way, but listening to people call their spouses and children to let them know that they are about to die in an attempt to retake the plane is much more immediate and visceral. Director Peter Markle and writer Nevin Schreiner, both TV-movie veterans, know exactly what buttons to push to make Flight 93 an emotionally raw experience.
It's tempting to say that the movie's ability to elicit tears marks it as a success, and at first, that's really all that matters. Since the events of the day are so well-known, there's a palpable tension to such mundane activities as walking through airport security, calling home to give arrival times and handing over boarding passes. Markle and Schreiner never miss an opportunity to remind viewers that these doomed people are about to lose their loved ones (there are plenty of mentions of children and anniversaries). After the terrorists take over the aircraft, the first panicked phone call home packs a serious emotional punch.
But then all the movie does for the rest of its running time is pack such punches; by the third or fourth tearful goodbye, it becomes something akin to tragedy porn. Although the acting is mostly decent and the production values are passable, Flight 93 isn't so much drama as it is a vehicle for re-experiencing tragedy, and I'm not quite sure why anyone would want to do that.
With networks panicking over DVR users skipping commercials more frequently, there are bound to arise many stupid ideas to combat this trend. One of the stupider is on the air this week on CBS: The Courier, a "micro-series" running for seven episodes over nine nights during commercial breaks on the network's 9 p.m. shows. The first episode (on January 24) ran 60 seconds, with subsequent episodes lasting 40 seconds. Despite allegedly being a sort of espionage action-adventure, The Courier still looks like a car commercial and, not surprisingly, is sponsored by Pontiac.
The longer first episode barely had time for two lines of dialogue before it was over, so the shorter episodes are likely to be even less satisfying. It's hard to imagine that any DVR users are even going to notice that this is a "series" and not a commercial, and harder still to imagine that they'll care. It's not doing much for CBS' regular programming, either: In order to catch the first episode, I flipped on CSI: Miami for less than two minutes, caught The Courier (which aired at the top of the first break) and promptly changed the channel, skipping both the commercials and the actual show.