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9/11 documentary director wants truth to prevail
By Sue Zeidler
1 hour, 3 minutes ago
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - The director of a new documentary on September 11 fears
that two upcoming Hollywood dramatizations of the World Trade Center attacks may
eclipse her project.
Reuters Photo: Linda Ellman, director
of the documentary 'On Native Soil', in
an undated photo. (Handout/Reuters)
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"I hope the truth does not get lost
amongst the fiction," Linda Ellman, a
former NBC News producer, who made her film directorial debut with "On Native Soil,"
told Reuters.
"I don't have a problem with fictionalized stories or fictionalized efforts about 9/11,
because people need to be kept aware and should never forget. I just hope the truth
isn't replaced by fiction, because the truth is shocking," she said.
Ellman was referring to film director Oliver Stone 's upcoming "World Trade Center," a
drama about two police officers trapped under the smoking rubble of the collapsed
buildings, opening nationwide on August 9, and the ABC television network miniseries
"The Path to 9/11," debuting on September 10.
Unlike those works, Ellman's goal with "On Native Soil," airing next month on cable
channel Court TV, was to stay true to the 9/11 Commission Report -- the government's
account of the suicide hijackings that killed about 3,000 people -- and present an
historically accurate version of events as they unfolded, almost in real time.
All of these films, as well as other documentaries and television specials, are being
released to coincide with the fifth anniversary of the attacks.
Ellman was approached by producer Jeff Hays to direct the project with a budget of just
over $1 million, and immediately saw opportunities and challenges.
"Millions of copies of the book had been sold, but nobody was reading it," Ellman said.
567 PAGES, ONE TRUE TALE
After plowing through the 567-page "9/11 Commission Report" in late 2004, Ellman set
out to capture the story of victims' families who were key in pressing the government to
form the bipartisan panel that investigated the tragedy and recommended reforms.
"My goal was to expose the truth about 9/11 that's been hiding in plain sight. When it
became clear to me that there almost wasn't a 9/11 Commission had it not been for this
small group of people, that was even more upsetting," she said.
Ellman said one of the biggest challenges was winning the families' trust. She contacted
each, one by one, and conducted what became "deeply personal and painful"
interviews.
interviews.
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Court TV bought the rights to broadcast the film, whose full name is "On Native Soil:
The Documentary of the 9/11 Commission Report," to air on August 21.
Lionsgate Entertainment plans to release the film on DVD on August 22.
The movie, narrated by Kevin Costner
and Hilary Swank , includes never-beforeseen interviews with victims' family members, as well as familiar footage of the day's
events, Osama bin Laden
in Afghanistan
declaring his intentions on television in
1997 and former White House counterterrorism expert Richard Clarke telling victims'
families, "Your government failed you."
Another scene features badly burned survivor Harry Waizer saying about Secretary of
State Condoleezza Rice : "She will not acknowledge that (the government) made a
misjudgment. And that galls me. That angers me."
Other scheduled programs dealing with the September 11 attacks include CNN's "In the
Footsteps of Osama bin Laden," National Geographic
Channel's "The Final Report:
Osama's Escape," and the History Channel's "The Miracle of Stairway B."
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