[mousepod]

OK... very brief review for those who care:

- The movie was pretty much a mess, particularly the first half. They tried to cram way too much information into a very short time, all the while trying to keep the excitement level up.
- I was very aware of the artificial soundtrack. Heavy metal music during a takedown of the bad guys? Maybe in a Michael Mann movie.
- The acting was fine, but the characters that were based on people I was familiar with were clearly two-dimensional.

But these and other observations pale in comparison to the one most important point. The theme of the movie.

BALLS.

The message of the movie was: it takes BALLS to battle the terrorists.

It reminded me of the famous Lenny Bruce routine about Jewish and Goyish, where he made lists of things "Jewish" and "Goyish", but was really a list of "cool" (Dig: I'm Jewish. Count Basie's Jewish. Ray Charles is Jewish. Eddie Cantor's goyish.)

The Path to 9/11 version goes something like this:
"Dig. John O'Neill had Balls. Markie Mark's brother had Balls. George Tenet might have had Balls, but was used to getting kicked in them. Madeline Albright acted like she had Balls but really was Ball-less. Same goes for Ambassador Bodine, who was really more of a Bitch. In fact, most of the guys and gals on the ground had Balls. Most of the folks who worked in offices inside the beltway were Ball-less. Ramzi Yousef, Mohammed Atta and the rest of the "bad guys" thought they had Balls, but were really just crazy - why else would they do what they do with no provocation? Massoud from the Northern Alliance had Big Balls. Just in case you thought that we think no women have Balls, CIA analyst Patricia Carver did, even though she cried. Remember that cop who opened the laptop without a warrant? She had Balls. Oh yeah... going after terrorists by ignoring people's right to privacy? That has Balls. The right to privacy? No Balls. ABC News reporters have Balls. Clinton? He's a politician who relies on keeping a delicate political balance both nationally and internationally. That concept has no Balls. George W Bush? His last-minute agreement to give the shoot-down order after planes have hit the WTC and the Pentagon? Could be a show of Balls. But wait, the onscreen title card epilogue that gives some of the 9/11 commission's review of Bush's progress shows that he too, has no Balls."

The Path to 9/11 was sloppy, not particularly illuminating, and while the dramatic license may have hurt Albright and Cohen, it really was fairly bleh. If I got anything from the movie, it was that the "bad guys" were doing more and more bad things, and that they were willing to wait for the right moment to have the greatest effect. The fact that they haven't been caught just left me with the feeling that it's not over.