ShareThisIn the days following Sept. 11, 2001, funeral after funeral became part of the grim scene for many New York firefighters and their families.
Ten years later, it's happening again.
"It's been tough, I have to say. We lost two firefighters this year, between two weeks of each other, to cancer from the dust they breathed in," said filmmaker Jules Naudet.
The lives of Naudet and his brother, Gedeon, changed forever that Tuesday. People don't always remember their names, but they might recall the story of the two French brothers who captured astonishing footage from inside the World Trade Center as well as the first jetliner hitting the North Tower.
In downtown Manhattan to shoot a documentary about a probationary firefighter with Engine 7, Ladder 1, Jules Gaudet was out on a call to check a reported gas leak.
As American Flight 11 thundered overhead, he raised his camera and captured one of the few images of the historic event. The resulting documentary, "9/11," gets an encore showing on CBS on Sunday at 8 p.m. EDT. Hosted by actor Robert De Niro and updated, "9/11: Ten Years Later" is a remarkable testament to survival on a very dark day. Along with director Paul Greengrass' feature film "United 93" and the documentary "7 Days in September," these are among the most riveting works produced in the years immediately following the terrorist attacks.
The Naudet brothers and their film partner, former firefighter James Hanlon, who narrates the documentary, previously revisited many of the surviving Engine 7 rescue workers for a fifth-year-anniversary edition.
Some of the younger guys have gotten married, some are now dads. Others changed jobs. Tony Benetatos, the rookie being filmed by the Naudets that day, is currently studying to take the lieutenants test.
But many others are sick, and dying. "It's the new reality, and they are all very much concerned," Jules Naudet said.
He encourages donations to the Uniformed Firefighters Association Scholarship Fund, which benefits the families of those who responded that day.
The filmmakers themselves were exposed to dangers of the day. Jules rushed into the North Tower and was inside when the South fell. It's not easy watching this movie -- although it cuts away from what surely must have been gruesome footage, at one point the nearby crashes of victims who jumped or fell from upper stories are audible.
"I think, strangely enough, our therapy was working on the documentary," Jules Naudet said. "I think that helped quite a lot that we had to see it over and over again for the edit ... it kind of purged the trauma."
Now longtime residents of New York City, the brothers will spend Sept. 11 as they do each year -- visiting the firehouse in the morning and attending a memorial service later.
The program won a 2002 Emmy Award for outstanding nonfiction special, as well as a 2003 Peabody Award.
But there are some who would discredit the Naudets and Hanlon. Google their names and most of the top hits are websites of conspiracy theorists who claim that the footage was faked, or worse, that they were in on a government orchestration of the chaos.
"I think it's a reality that people will want to believe what they want to believe, regardless of the proof in front of them," Jules Naudet said. "In the beginning, we thought it was something funny and surreal, but then they started showing up at the front doors of firefighters, demanding they 'tell the truth.' "
For the past three months, the filmmakers have been traveling the country for their latest project, a series on White House chiefs of staff. Jules Naudet said that moving on doesn't mean forgetting the plight of the 9/11 first responders.
"People say, 'We remember,' but all this is pretty shameful. All these politicians use 9/11 and firefighters as symbols of heroism, but they have forgotten them," he said, urging lawmakers to quit stalling on the subject of health benefits.
"Sept. 11 might have killed 2,700 people but from the day after to who-knows-when, how many more will die?"
"United 93"
This feature film was made in 2006 after extensive discussions between Greengrass and family members of those who died on the flight that crashed in Somerset County, Pa. Initially, there was great concern that a few passengers would be singled out as heroes; such was the case in a few previously filmed versions of the event.
Because no one knows for absolute certain what happened on board that morning, Greengrass -- who also wrote the screenplay -- once told The New York Times: "Does what (the families) want accord with how I see it?"
In the end, he makes the attempted overthrow of the terrorists a team effort led by a small take-charge group of passengers.
The result is a masterpiece in building tension. History has already recorded the outcome, but it's nonetheless a shock.
Playing out in real time and in many cases using genuine air traffic controllers, pilots and flight attendants instead of professional actors, the story begins with passengers boarding one of the four airplanes that would crash that day. It follows the early confusion as air traffic controllers realize something is amiss, but failure to communicate feeds viewer frustration.
The director purposely cast little-known actors to play the passengers; only Cheyenne Jackson, who plays Mark Bingham, might be widely recognized today because of his stints on "Glee" and "30 Rock."
By the time the famous words "Let's roll" are quietly uttered and we see the push to regain control of the cockpit, it's still hard to arrive at the end.
"7 Days in September"
Director Steven Rosenbaum's "7 Days in September" might at first appear to be a hodgepodge of video and photo images from the days immediately following the attack in New York City -- he edited the work of 27 filmmakers who captured the chaos, some while fleeing the massive clouds of World Trade Center debris.
But that was the story of the day, wasn't it? All across America, the same images were played and replayed until the viewer has the sense of being stuck in some horrible loop.
As a companion piece to 2002's "7 Days," Rosenbaum and his online curation company, Magnify.net, have released an iPad-only application: "The 9/11 Memorial: Past, Present and Future." It's free until Sept. 12, then it will cost $9.95.
More than 400 photos and hours of video will be featured in this interactive program, some of which were originally available through the online Camera Planet archives.
The history of the WTC and its rebirth are the focus, with emphasis on the development of the new Trade Center and museum.
(Email Maria Sciullo at msciullo(at)post-gazette.com.)
(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)
Must credit Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
