Month: September 2003

Man oh man. Once again, it all comes down to Johnny Depp. I know, this is supposed to be all about Rodriguez wrapping up the El Mariachi trilogy, putting some finishing touches on the whole revenge story, crossing Ts and dotting Is and being done with it. And then outta left field comes Depp, stealing the film from Antonio Banderas’s piercing gaze and deliciously impenetrable accent and Salma Hayek’s petulant pout and bodacious bod and Rodriguez’s explosions and slo-mo gunfights, taking what’s basically a supporting role and making the film all about him.

If you want an idea of what New York was like in the immediate days after 9/11, here you go. For me, it’s a shattering reminder — not that I need one — of that lost daze all us New Yorkers wandered around in for weeks in the fall of 2001. I pretty much start sobbing as *The Guys* opens, with footage from a firehouse security camera, one lone fireman in shorts standing on the sidewalk, just watching the world go by; the timestamp reads 09.11.01 8:48am, the last innocent moment before a shower of office paper starts to fall in the street.

Eleven directors from around the world react to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, each film exactly 11 minutes, 9 seconds long (11-9 was the date in the inverted European system). The results are personal and political, abstract and straightforward, bittersweet and mournful, angry and searching: for an understanding of the attacks themselves and … more…