- Air Force One (1997)
- President James Marshall (Harrison Ford) announces on a trip to Russia that the United States will no longer negotiate with terrorist groups nor will the nation be afraid to stand up to them. He makes this claim after a man named General Ivan Radek (Jurgen Prochnow), who is a radical Russian military director with nuclear weapons, is captured and jailed by special forces. Marshall does not know, however, that a small band of militants who sympathize with Radek, have penetrated Air Force One’s security system. On his trip home, the militants attempt to band against Marshall and try to force him to restore Radek to power. They take his wife and his daughter hostage until they receive the answer they want from him. The Vice President is forced to handle things in Washington, while at the same time wondering if the plane the President is on with the militants has survived. A conflict arises on board the plane when the President is forced to choose between the lives of his wife and his daughter or the dignity of his country. The film concentrates on the role of governmental decisions and how terrorism affects the way in which things are handled both on the ground and in the air.
- Con Air (1997)
- Directed by Simon West, this film follows Cameron Poe (Nicolas Page), who is a highly decorated United States Ranger. Poe returns home to see his wife and runs into drunken regulars. In trying to protect his wife from one of the men, Poe commits a murder and is convicted of involuntary manslaughter. After eight years, he is finally released from the federal penitentiary and can return home to his wife and daughter. In order to get home, he has to get on a plane with other prisoners, some of whom are the most dangerous criminals in the country. On board the plane, these prisoners attempt to take control of the plane and flee the country. As they take control, officials on the ground want to shoot the plane down. In order to save himself, Poe is forced to play along with the criminals, while at the same time coming up with a plan to deviate their plan from succeeding. Only three people on the ground know an alternative as to how to save Poe â€" US marshal Vince Larkin, his wife, and his daughter. The plane is forced to crash along the strip in Las Vegas, and while some of the victims attempt to escape, Poe is successfully reunited with his wife and daughter in the end. This movie focuses (like United 93) on the perseverance and struggle an innocent man has to deal with in order to survive a plane taken over by criminals.
- World Trade Center (2006)
- Oliver Stone concentrates here on the aftermath of the terrorist attacks on September 11, 2001. The film focuses on the true story of two individuals that day, John McLoughlin and William J. Jimeno, who worked for the Port Authority Police Department. Both men went inside the World Trade Center before its collapse and were ultimately caught underneath the rubble. This movie focuses on how the families and friends of these two individuals failed to give into the acts of terrorism and how the rescuers persevered to find these two men, who were still alive under the massive amounts of residue that existed because of the attacks. The film follows their conversations with each other underneath twenty feet of rubble, talking about their families, their hopes, and their disappointments. It follows their wives and children, who suffered hardships with no communication about them, and the heroes that found them nearly twelve hours after the attack. World Trade Center accentuates the tragedy of September 11th and the way in which it affected so many people throughout the world.
See Also
DC 9/11: Time of Crisis (2003)
The Flight That Fought Back (2005)
The Heroes of Flight 93 (2006)
The High and the Mighty (1954)
Let's Roll: The Story of Flight 93 (2002)
