Where were you when the towers fell? For my generation that became the question that replaced asking where you were when John Lennon was shot…or JFK for the generation before that. Traumatic events invite people to share where they were at when they got the word that something insane had just happened in the world, becoming a shared experience we could all relate to. For me, I was just arriving at work doing a remodel for Sears and all the TV’s in the store were turned on showing the World Trade Center on fire. We collectively stopped working and stood around the TV’s watching it unfold. My first child was three weeks old and I was working extra jobs so my wife could stay home for a while taking care of her. The world went from being a lovely place full of the hopes of a new parent to a scary place where acts like that in New York City could happen without warning.
On top of reminiscing about where we were, we also seek catharsis as a group whenever something huge like this happens. Sometimes that comes in the form of fiction, as was the case with Jonathan Safran Foer, a jewish author living in New York City at the time of the attacks. His novel, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, released in 2005, took an inside look at a nine-year-old boy whose father was in one of the towers when the planes crashed into them. The novel is well written but not everyone appreciated it because of the use of the attacks as a primary plot point. Some felt that it was too soon to be writing fiction about it. Others felt that no amount of time was enough to make this topic acceptable for a fictional novel. No fictional account could do the holocaust justice and the twin towers were no different. That mentality, while understandable, cheats people out of an opportunity to understand, through the eyes of a child, what families went through in the aftermath of September 11th. It doesn’t matter if it is fiction or not.
Nine-year-old Oskar Schell (Thomas Horn) an autistic (potentially with Asperger Syndrome) young boy, lives with his parents in New York City. He has a special relationship with his father (Tom Hanks) who challenges the boy with puzzles that require him to search throughout the city, talking to people, and learning all about the world around him. On September 11, 2001 (referred to by Oskar as The Worst Day), Oskar is sent back home from school immediately after classes begin but he doesn’t know why, just that something bad is happening. When he gets home there are five messages on the answering machine from his father who was in the World Trade Center for a meeting at the time of the attacks. The phone rings again and Oskar is too afraid to answer it, hearing his father asking for him repeatedly on the recording, eventually getting cut off presumably when the tower he was in collapsed. Upset and ashamed at himself for being unable to answer the phone he takes the tape out and hides from everyone, including his mother (Sandra Bullock), that his father had ever called.
A year later, Oskar is digging through his father’s closet and accidentally knocks over a glass vase on the top shelf. It shatters on the floor revealing a small envelope was hiding inside. On the envelope is written one word: Black. Inside is a single key, nothing else. Believing his father left this key for him to figure out where it belongs, Oskar sets out to dig into this new mystery. He assumes the word on the envelope is a name and, utilizing the New York City phone book, he makes a very long list of everyone listed with that last name as well as a coordinated plan on how he can stealthily get around the city and visit them all until he discovers where that key goes to. Meanwhile he has grown distant with his mother whom he resents for being the one who survived out of the two. This has caused him to lash out at her, even telling her to her face he wished she had been the one to die, not his father. “So do I,” she responds back, silencing him.
Across the street lives his grandmother whom Oskar communicates with via walkie talkie. One night he sneaks out to see her only to find an old man, known simply as The Renter (Max Von Sydow) in her apartment. The Renter is mute, choosing not to speak for reasons he never discloses. He communicates through yes and no tattoos on his palms as well as writing in a small notebook. Oskar is nervous about him at first but warms up to him quickly and opens up about his quest to find the lock to the key. The Renter offers to go with him and help his search. This goes on for a while but Oskar gets more and more upset the more this mystery eludes him and The Renter becomes convinced he is only hurting the boy by helping him. The mystery of the key will eventually get revealed but it is not what Oskar expected it to be. It is, however, an emotional story for the one the key was meant for and, upon hearing the true story behind it, Oskar is able to come to a level of peace over the senseless tragedy of his father’s death and make amends with his mother who, in a surprise twist, had figured out early on what he was up to and taken steps to help protect her son while he was out traversing the city.
For some real world tragedies no time is enough time to get past them and move on. The pain is just too much. That has never stopped people from trying to create art, whether it be poetry, paintings, novels, and even movies about it. In 1997 Life is Beautiful released to the theaters to critical acclaim. It was a comedy that took place partially in a concentration camp during World War II. More than fifty years after the atrocities of the Nazi’s and there were people speaking out about how offensive it was to make a picture like this. Several Jewish groups spoke up about how this film wasn’t making light of the tragedy but showing the ingenuity of humanity in light of those tragedies. Still, some people just couldn’t get past the very real emotions such an event still stir up in them. There is nothing wrong with feeling that strongly but sometimes it is also important to understand that not everyone will feel the same way or handle grief in the same manner. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close had the same type of reactions to it when the novel released just four years after the events that inspired it. People accused Jonathan Safran Foer of capitalizing off the suffering of others. The book was accused of being tone-deaf and in bad taste, too. This wasn’t a true story of the events of that day being told by someone who was a part of it. This was fiction.
The uproar of offended people grew even louder when the film released in 2011 just two months after the ten year anniversary of the attacks. The response to it was divisive, with some heralding it for its daring, sometimes troubling, depiction of grief. Others felt that ten years was nowhere near long enough from the event for a film like this to be made, especially when there were so many people around who had witnessed it first hand. These are all legitimate responses to it. I grew up in Montana and Idaho and was far from the events of that tragic day. I cannot speak for those who suffered trauma and lost loved ones in that attack and the subsequent ones at the Pentagon and Flight 93. I refuse to try to speak for those people because that would be doing them a disservice. All I can really do is look at this film from my perspective and respond to it that way.
The character of Oskar Schell is fascinating. Thomas Horn has done an amazing performance bringing this character to life. Watching him here it is a shame that he didn’t stick with acting. This would be his only to date theatrical film. When he has learned his father has died he at first shuts down, hiding underneath his bed and not responding to anyone. Later he will try to rationalize things, analyzing why an empty coffin is buried in the cemetery since no body was recovered. He is prone to outbursts, not just in anger but also when he finally has someone he can talk to and unload his pent up feelings on. The Renter serves that purpose initially. Later, William Black (Jeffrey Wright), the man the mysterious key belongs to, will also serve that purpose, getting an opportunity to return the favor with a story of his own.
Max Von Sydow is an interesting choice to play The Renter. One of his earliest roles was Antonius Block, the man playing a game of chess with Death himself in The Seventh Seal. Here he is attempting to help a young man cope with death, no easy feat, and slowly realizing that despite his best intentions this is something Oskar will have to work out on his own. When he calls it quits and leaves, Oskar yells at him and accuses him of all sorts of things including a suspicion that the old man might even be his grandfather. Max Von Sydow brings a level of stoicism to the proceedings all without being able to speak a single word. He would be honored with an Oscar nomination for this role.
The end of the movie is an emotional roller coaster as Oskar finally finds the owner of the key but is disappointed that it was not what he thought it was. He also finally solves the last adventure his father had laid out for him before he had died. But even more importantly he opens back up to his mother, unknowing that she has been helping him all along behind the scenes. There is so much emotion going on between those two as he finally welcomes her back into him.
This film was accused of being Oscar bait when it released in the winter of 2011. Perhaps that is true. Regardless, it didn’t win any even though it did get two nominations including Best Picture. Looking back on it now that more than a decade has passed it really isn’t tone-deaf as it was accused of being. It also isn’t insensitive. People who lived through the events of September 11 may still have a hard time watching this but the same can be said for other films that dealt with it. Ignoring the history would be even more offensive in my opinion much like going back to older films that featured the twin towers and digitally erasing them like they didn’t exist. This film is dealing with the grief of those who lost loved ones and it does a good job exploring that aspect of things. It’s fiction but that doesn’t make it offensive nor does it mean it shouldn’t exist. Whether you will get anything out of it will depend entirely on you as everyone is different and sees things differently. For me, I liked it back in 2011 and I appreciate it even more now.
Academy Award Nominations:
Best Picture: Scott Rudin
Best Supporting Actor: Max Von Sydow
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Release Date: December 25, 2011
Running Time: 129 Minutes
Rated PG-13
Starring: Tom Hanks, Sandra Bullock, Thomas Horn, Max Von Sydow, Viola Davis, John Goodman and Jeffrey Wright
Directed By: Stephen Daldry
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