Without Warning: Terror in the Towers

In Britain we have a show called 999 where real life disasters are reconstructed on screen . I don`t know if there is an equivalent show in the US but watching WITHOUT WARNING made me think I was watching a feature length episode of 999 because this TVM is filmed entirely on video tape so it can be intercut with real life footage of the 1993 world trade centre bombing and feels too much like a reconstruction than a drama. It`s all rather understated and fairly undramatic but I suppose that`s better than the glossy PEARL HARBOR approach of having hunky up and coming stars shouting " Get me a damn firehose " and running into a blazing building in slo-mo . And I guess there is some irony of seeing a then pre ER George Clooney spending much of this TVM in a hospital bed as an injured fireman . But it`s impossible nowadays to write the initials WTC or hear the words " World trade centre " without thinking of the date 9/11

This was a good movie but I realize with what happened on Sept. 11,2001 it may be hard to watch. I thought the cast did an excellent job. George Clooney was good and John Karlen too. The whole cast was good. I know this is about the bombing and I know for some it will be very difficult to watch. It may be difficult for me to watch again for a while too.

You wondered if we had a show in the U.S. like 999, yes we do it is on channel 69 The National Geographic Channel it is called Seconds From Disaster,the show takes viewers back in time to before the disaster happened and it tells at what time what went on,until the disaster finally happened. Like when DC 10 Delta Airlines Flight 232 when they reconstructed what happened, and they put together the whole plane they noticed that the fan disc was missing from engine number 2 which controlled the fuel lodges to the airplane.When it detached from the plane it made the passengers feel and hear a BAAAAAAAAAAANNNNG sound and then the crew had to have an emergency landing after they had radioed Minneappolsis- St.Paul Airport, they told them to land at the nearby Sioux Gate Airport in the sleepy little town of Sioux City,Iowa.There they would never expect to crash land and lose one crew member and 111 passengers,some of them as young as 1 1/2 old.GE The manufacturer of the fan disc offered a big reward if the defective fan disc was found.An Iowa farm wife found the fan disc split in two in her field when she was plowing the earth she hit something and when she went to see what it was she put it and the other part she had found while plowing in another part of her field and a circle was what she found and the national newspapers got wind and she was rewarded with the reward money from GE.When they got it together with the rest of the plane they figured out what happened and why Flight 232 crashed.The fan disc had a small fracture in it smaller than a human finger nail.It was a manufacturing error that ended up in disaster.

Continuing my plan to watch every George Clooney movie in order, I come to 1993's TV movie Without Warning: Terror in The Towers.

This is based on the 1993 bombing attack on the Twin Towers in New York.

I find it crazy they made a movie and had it air on TV, three months after it actually happened. I liked the the film's use of original news footage to develop the sense of reality!!

It was great to see James Avery (Uncle Phil in The Fresh Prince of Bel Air) and I love to see Andre Braugher (Captain Holt in Brooklyn Nine Nine) as for Clooney, he plays a nice fireman (we know he is nice as he tries to give a homeless man money after already giving him a big jacket and he stops a rodent being killed) who attends the emergency

This was directed by Alan J Levi, who directed a lot of popular TV shows and he does well here. Outside of the core cast, some of the acting from certain people, is not great, though.

It kind of rushed towards it's conclusion, which is a bit unsatisfying. But I certainly think it's worth a watch.

The full movie is available to watch on YouTube.

The bombing didn't last long enough to make a good movie out of it. I realize that sounds a bit crass. I beg the forgiveness of people whose lives were scarred by this terrible event. My point is, if you're making a disaster movie, you want the disaster to last for a while. That, frankly, is what makes the movie worth watching. The sinking of the Titanic is absolutely perfect for the movies - 2 hours and 40 minutes from the moment the ship hit the iceberg to when it vanished beneath the waves. Ideal! You can be assured that James Cameron pondered the timing as he thought about doing the movie. "The Towering Inferno" - that skyscraper took forever to burn. This film - a lot of preface, a lot of emergency responders, very little oomph. I do like the outdoor shots with shards of snow falling down.