ThiefHott Too much of everything

Afouotos Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

Roman Sampson One of the most extraordinary films you will see this year. Take that as you want.

Billy Ollie Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

BruceUllm This picture was a waste of effort to produce and is a waste of effort to understand. The characters do not elicit any sympathy from me and represent nihilists and losers. If THEY can't have success, then NOBODY can. So, they join a so-called holy war and become terrorists. History is full of such fools who decide that all modernity is wrong simply because they can't or won't fit in.If this picture accomplished anything, it deepened the American suspicion of all things and all people from the Middle East. One minor and somewhat amusing thing I noticed: our main character never could get a decent shave -- even on the Big Day.

wrlang The Hamburg Cell is a docudrama about the cell of Muslim fundamentalists that conducted the 9/11 attack. It starts about 5 years before 9/11 and follows many of the pilots in their efforts to get flight training and covers what was going on in some of their private lives. Not sure how much of it was accurate, seemed pretty realistic to me. Most seemed to just be looking for some fulfillment in their lives, but chose an extreme way to get it. It also shows the missteps, in hindsight, by US law enforcement agencies as these people could have been caught many times during their training. I don't think it really explained the reasons the terrorists chose to conduct their attack, but I guess we will never really know all the facts behind it. Technically a good film with few continuity errors and some good cinematography. The acting seemed a little hollow.

Nubian-3 I just taped this off HBO this morning and watched it later on tonight.Reading the TV Guide synopsis it suggested like a previous poster stated that some would find the film objectionable because of how the terrorist were portrayed.No they were not given to us as some evil monsters as most would choose to believe.I'm glad instead we got to see who and what they really were.A group of men who looked upon the decadence and vast moral decline of this modern world as a direct influence of the United States upon other nations.Their Muslim beliefs,as they interpreted it led them to singling out America for the devastating attack Sep 11,2001.Religious beliefs have been taken this far before in the past resulting in unforgivable atrocities done to the innocent.One would just wonder whatever religious belief a person might have,wouldn't a true God fearing heart question even the thought of committing such acts?Looking at their views on the subject and my being a Christian I find it quite absurd that they would imagine any rewards awaiting them in the afterlife.Come on now,upon their death they will be greeted by a number of beautiful virgin women?An intelligent mind would or should ask itself "Is this really how my God works"? They might say well yes we are fighting our enemy and we kill innocent people just like the American soldiers.Soldiers who believe they are fighting a war condoned by God too.They feel their acts are honorable just as our boys feel their military duty is honorable.Well this is what this film shows us.I think is is necessary for us to see their real mental frame of mind.I know they and others following those beliefs are truly mislead.Many thanks to HBO and contributors across the Atlantic for this interesting look at the factual story that led to the Sep 11 disaster.

duibe As I began watching this film on HBO, I started to feel uneasy because all the trademarks of a TV Movie-of-the-week began to manifest- boring cinematography, unrefined performances, contrived momentum, etc. However, as the film progressed, I was drawn into certain story angles, and the plight of some of the lead characters became engrossing. Kamel's understated performance as Atta, as well as the two young leads playing husband and wife, kept me interested. The film gradually grinded into thriller territory, and the final moments were admittedly chilling and well-constructed by director Antonia Bird. However, what was most lacking from this film were the PSYCHOLOGICAL motivations of the characters. A story of such grand scope is difficult to tell in detail, as one can assume, but the most important elements driving these characters- the disgust and anger towards American foreign policy- seemed left out of this film. It seemed "hinted at" in certain scenes, but the screenplay never fully explored the burning hatred from the inside. It was still unclear to me why the once-agnostic Lebanese medical student allowed himself to be so easily roped in by the cell's extremist philosophies. Had the screenplay explored this in more detail, this film would be what it should have been- a tragic portrait of manifested hatred among young, misguided Islamic jihadists.