FYP Fallout

It was perhaps rather ironic that the film the CU chose to watch for our Movie Night towards the end of last week's Fresher Week was Reign Over Me. This is very much a post-9/11 film, and one I shall no doubt be writing a little about in my Final Year Project on 9/11 and its effects on culture.

Adam Sandler plays Charlie, a guy whose wife and daughters were on one of the planes that crashed into the Twin Towers in New York. Don Cheadle plays a dentist who was Charlie's college roommate - happily married but with obviously something missing in his life. It is a story of how they rescue each other from their misery.

Get it? Got it? Good.

In all fairness it was a pretty good movie; I actually really enjoyed it. Sure, it was a bit depressing in some places, (in fact in some places it was a lot depressing), but some great acting from Sandler, who surprised me, (having not seen Punch Drunk Love yet), and Cheadle, who I've seen enough of to know is a pretty decent actor.

The one sort of niggling feeling I have though is this, and here's where my FYP really begins to infiltrate my everyday life: does 9/11 really have a place in this film? Is it necessary for it to be a plot device? Surely Charlie's family could have been killed in any accident, and it would still work really well, becoming much more of a study about post-traumatic depression. In fact, 9/11 here is arguably treated rather like this kind of accident: a tragic event that unfortunately happens on a daily basis.

9/11 was NOT a car crash. I've already seen and read enough about it to know that it changed our world forever. And although Reign Over Me is a good film, I enjoyed it and I recommend it to you all, the 9/11 element is not necessary.

Laters.