The Fictional Path to 9/11

The New York Times: "Perhaps the entertainment industry will come up with a few lasting lessons from the outcry over ABC’s “dramatization” of the events leading up to the terrorist attacks on 9/11. One suggestion: when attempting to recreate real events on screen, you do not show real people doing things they never did.Perhaps the entertainment industry will come up with a few lasting lessons from the outcry over ABC’s “dramatization” of the events leading up to the terrorist attacks on 9/11. One suggestion: when attempting to recreate real events on screen, you do not show real people doing things they never did.

The film, a fictionalized portrayal of the nation’s failure to head off the attack on the World Trade Center, was shown Sunday and Monday. The second episode was wrapped around a live speech by President Bush, so it was especially unfortunate that the most questionable scenes all seemed to make the Clinton administration look worse, and Mr. Bush look better, than the record indicates.

Some of the most controversial scenes were cut at the last minute. But the first episode, for instance, showed C.I.A. agents and the charismatic leader of Afghanistan’s Northern Alliance perched outside a bin Laden camp, ready to swoop in and capture him if only Washington approved. The authorization is not granted, and the Afghan leader rails, “Are there no men in Washington, or are they all cowards?” Yet neither C.I.A. operatives nor the Northern Alliance leader ever laid eyes on Osama bin Laden, terrorism experts say. [more]