See "United 93"

In a week we will be marking the five-year anniversary of September 11th. I have already suggested seeing Oliver Stone's "World Trade Center," which I think does a good job bringing back the emotions of the day without overdoing it. Another excellent film is "United 93," about the hijacked plane that crashed in Pennsylvania. It's on DVD.

What gives "United 93" both credibility and strength is its use of so many of the real people from that day--especially the air-traffic controllers. In addition to the excellent, realistic portrayal of the drama on the plane (recreated from numerous cockpit and cell-phone conversations), there is a palpable mixture of confusion and courage among those on the ground who were watching what happened.

My bet is that spending time with both these films will be a much more rewarding use of your time than the countless "Five Years Later" retrospectives that are beginning to appear. It was a day when most of us were close to a TV somewhere, watching what was happening and going through a welter of strong emotions.

CNN has announced it is replaying its September 11th video feed all day on its website. Watching that will allow us to recapture part of our own experience of the day. But there's more to be gained by getting as close as we can to seeing what happened through the eyes of others who were close to the event. I think both these films invite us to do that.