All of a sudden a massive plume of smoke started emerging out from behind the North Tower, which of course was the collapsing of the South Tower, but the Toronto reporter didn't take notice and kept talking and facing the camera. When the anchor asked what was happening behind him, the reporter turned around and said, "Well ...something, obviously, has happened but I can't say what, exactly."

On the other hand, I think it may be time to get beyond the mere reliving of that day and start absorbing it more circumspectly, with perhaps the pulse of reactive patriotism turned down a notch or two.

I'm frankly getting a little tired of all these rah-rah, spirit-lifting books that have been turning up. I was flipping through some anniversary tomes in a Barnes and Noble a few days ago and they all seemed like feel-better propaganda, and all with the same sentiments. It was awful but we weren't defeated. We're a nation of wholesome, fair-minded, relatively blameless people. Everyone caught up in the disaster that day behaved honorably and selflessly, we love our flag, the WTC towers were beautiful, and we'll get those guys.

I personally don't know if we're all that wonderful or faultless as a nation or a people, and I think it might help if there were a few more books or magazine articles that paid at least some attention to the root causes or motivations behind this terrible act, and if we tried to digest some of this. Life is not black and white. There are things that have happened and will happen on this planet that can best be understood by setting aside our pain for a moment and considering -- not embracing but considering -- the pain of others.

Does anyone know where Osama bin Laden is? Has anyone heard anything lately about how our intelligence operatives in Pakistan or Afghanistan are zeroing in on his whereabouts? Why hasn't reality given us a Jerry Bruckheimer ending? What's been happening so far feels more like a late '60s Costa Gavras film.

If they ever grab Mr. bin Laden, it might be cathartic if he were to be flown to New York and put inside a barred cage on wheels, surrounded by bulletproof glass, and then have the cage be slowly towed down Fifth Avenue as a kind of emotional cortege, starting at 96th Street and all the way down to Washington Square and then across to Greenwich Street and down to the World Trade Center site. People could bellow and scream and throw eggs and tomatoes, and some of them could find some closure. The Romans used to do this with the generals of conquered armies, and not without good reason.

Toronto Film Festival audiences, in any event, will be among those to get a taste of the latest wave of reactions -- more considered, less emotional -- to this tragic event. A gala screening of 11.09.01, a documentary about the tragedy composed of a series of shorts by various international filmmakers, including Youssef Chahine, Amos Gitaï, Shohei Imamura, Alejandro González Iñárritu, Claude Lelouch, Ken Loach, Samira Makhmalbaf, Mira Nair, Idrissa Ouedraogo, Sean Penn and Danis Tanoviç, will be shown on Wednesday, September 11, at Roy Thomson Hall.

A VARIETY article that appeared last month said that at least some of these shorts have an anti-American tone. I don't know what this means, but I suspect some will look at the tragedy from the perspective of other cultures, which probably means a broader and more exploratory view of the whys and wherefores. I can't say I'm surprised.

Shaft of Light

I can't stop reading well-researched reports about what happened that day. The more specific and unsparing, the better. I eat this shit up.

One of the best I've come across recently has been William Langeweische's second article about the disaster in the September 2002 issue of ATLANTIC MONTHLY. The series is called "American Ground: Unbuilding the World Trade Center," and part two is titled "The Rush to Recover." It's tremendous stuff. I strongly advise that readers go to the Atlantic's site and pay to read the first two installments, or just buy the print versions.

"The Rush to Recover" contains a wonderfully inspiring story about a guy who was on the 21st story of the North Tower when it collapsed, and somehow survived. I love it because it says that God or fate or whatever can sometimes show compassion or make random, senseless exceptions in allowing this or that person to duck out the back door.

Nearly 3,000 people died that day as a direct result of the attacks, but there were 18, Langeweische explains, who were either inside or under the WTC buildings at the time of their collapse who were recovered alive.

"Two other people were found alive," he reports. "Both were Port Authority employees caught at relatively high elevations in the North Tower. They did not 'surf' the collapse, as a couple of Port Authority cops were falsely rumored to have done in the South Tower, but they lived through falls that should have killed them."

One survivor was Genelle Guzman, a 31-year-old Port Authority employee who was in the stairwell on the 13th floor when the North Tower collapsed. Somehow she survived the fall and managed to avoid getting crushed. She spent some 27 hours lying trapped under rubble, seriously injured, before her rescue.

The other survivor was Pasquale Buzzelli, a 32-year-old staff engineer whose job was primarily to oversee work on the George Washington Bridge. Buzzelli was riding an intermediate stage elevator [up] to his office, on the 64th floor, when American Airlines Flight #11 slammed into the North Tower.

"The elevator shook violently and briefly dropped before catching itself and returning slowly to the starting point, the 'sky lobby' on the 44th floor," Langeweische writes. "When the doors opened, Buzzelli was confronted by a confusion of shouts and thick black smoke (presumably from jet fuel that had poured down other shafts). He retreated into the elevator, and with nowhere to go but up, instinctively pushed the button for his familiar 64th floor. It was a slow ride.

"When he got there, the floor looked well-lit and calm, and it was almost smoke-free. Most of the workers had already left, but more than a dozen remained, and were dutifully awaiting instructions from the authorities below, as apparently they had been asked to do by Port Authority and fire-department officials on the phone."

Buzzelli and roughly 16 of his coworkers didn't start to make their way down the stairwell in order to exit the building until just after 10 a.m., by which time the South Tower, which had also been hit, had just collapsed, although Buzzelli and the others didn't know this at the time.

The Port Authority workers "moved at different speeds and eventually spread out over at least nine floors," the article continues. "The stairway descended with left turns, in a counterclockwise direction, and it was of course windowless and completely cut off from the outside. About a third of the way down (in the forties) Buzzelli began to encounter exhausted firemen, some of whom were sitting on steps and resting. They were calm and said, 'Just keep going down. Clear run. Keep going down, clear run.'

"Buzzelli had just passed the 22nd floor when the North Tower gave way. It was 10:28 in the morning, an hour and 42 minutes after the attack. Buzzelli felt the building rumble, and immediately afterward heard a tremendous pounding coming at him from above, as the upper floors pancaked. Buzzelli's memory of it afterwards was distinct. The pounding was rhythmic, and it intensified fast, as if a monstrous boulder were bounding down the stairwell toward his head.

"He reacted viscerally by diving halfway down a flight of stairs, and curling into a corner of a landing. He knew the building was failing. Buzzelli was a Catholic. He closed his eyes and prayed for his wife and unborn child. He prayed for a quick death.

"Because his eyes were closed, he felt rather than saw the walls crack open around him. For an instant the walls folded onto his head and arms, and he felt pressure, but then the structure disintegrated beneath him, and he thought, 'I'm going,' and began to fall. He kept his eyes closed. He felt the weightlessness of acceleration. The sensation reminded him of thrill rides he had enjoyed at Great Adventure, in New Jersey. He did not enjoy it now, but did not actively dislike it either. He did not actively do anything at all.

"He felt the wind on his face, and a sandblasting effect as he tumbled through the clouds of debris. He saw four flashes of light from small blows to the head, and then another really bright flash when he landed. Right after that he opened his eyes, and it was three hours later.

"He sat up. He saw blue sky and a world of shattered steel and concrete. He had landed on a slab like a sacrificial altar, perched high among mountains of ruin. There was a drop of fifteen feet to the debris below him. He saw heavy smoke in the air. Above his head rose a lovely skeletal wall, a lacy gothic thing that looked as if it would topple at any moment. He remembered his fall exactly, and assumed therefore that he was dead.

"He waited to see if death would be as it is shown in the movies -- if an angel would come by, or if he would float up and see himself from the outside. But then he started to cough and to feel pain in his leg, and he realized that he was alive."

Reeves, MacLachlan, Superman

"Thanks for the Reeves story, but I'm beyond confused. Miramax rejects MacLachlan because he's not a big name who can ‘put butts in seats,’ and then they offer the role to Clive Owen ? What am I missing here?" -- Greg Howard

"Any chance my humble opinion will sway Miramax? I would love to see Kyle MacLachlan as Superman. As a kid, I had a huge crush on Superman (seen through daily reruns right after school) and, now, I think MacLachlan is a damn fine actor. Casting MacLachlan would definitely pull me into the theater for this movie. Can you send me the e-mail address of the fool at Miramax who's vacillating on this?" -- Suzanne Dundas

"The thing Miramax is missing here is that the icon of Superman is bigger than any star. There fore the idea of a murder/suicide being associated with the icon of Superman will put butts in the seats. This could be the star-making performance MacLachlan deserves, which Miramax, of course, would get credit for in the end, just like they did when Travolta turned up in PULP FICTION. However, wanting to now put Travolta into the Reeves role further indicates Miramax is forgetting about whatever indie spirit they once had. Theirs is an asinine logic that would make any suit at the majors feel proud (and smart)." -- Gary deBrown

"There's something mighty fishy about Miramax's reasoning in not wanting to use MacLachlan, as you report it. If MacLachlan is a box-office non-entity, what's Robert Downey or Clive Owen? Hell, what's Travolta lately? The 12-year-old TWIN PEAKS, a cult favorite that is finding a new audience on DVD, is described as a problem for MacLachlan but BATTLEFIELD EARTH, LUCKY NUMBERS and DOMESTIC DISTURBANCE are not the same for Travolta? (Now, SHOWGIRLS, on the other hand...)

"Plus, you add Travolta to the cast and suddenly it's a lot more expensive proposition. You're paying Travolta's star salary -- no more PULP FICTION union scale wages for him -- plus you have to upgrade his costars, pay for a script doctor to beef up his part, and subsidize his entourage, his caterer, his airplane. Besides, what does it matter who plays the supporting role if you've got Joaquin Phoenix? True, he's never proved he can carry a movie as a leading man, but he certainly didn't hurt the grosses of GLADIATOR or SIGNS.

"There must be some other reason for Miramax's foot-dragging. Maybe they're waiting to see how the similar AUTO FOCUS does this fall, or maybe they're waiting until Warner Bros. gets its act together with the SUPERMAN franchise so this puppy can piggyback it. Or maybe there's a SUPERMAN rights issue with Warners. But the supposed financial rationale behind the anybody-but-Kyle notion doesn't add up." -- Gary Susman, c/o ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY.

"For a number of years I've been researching a biography of George Reeves, with the help of his family and hundreds of friends and co-workers. I read your article with interest. The article you quoted at length is rife with errors, most of them recapitulated over the years until they have taken on the weight of truth without actually having any truth to them. I have not read the screenplay to the Polish Brothers film, but I pray they aren't falling for any of the clap-trap that contaminates Reeves's story in much of what has been published about him.

"Certainly Milo Speriglio, the private detective their 'Lemar Moglio' is obviously based on, was a stupendously unreliable source of information, having, as a just-starting-out agent, much less to do with the case than he pretended in later years (much like his self-promotional 'involvement' in the Marilyn Monroe ca se). I can refute much, if not all, of his version of the story, and absolutely can refute most of "Hollywood Kryptonite, a book which was dedicated to me (among others) in hardback, but which no longer was when the paperback edition came out as I'd gone public with my refutation.

"The fact that Howard Strickling is a character also concerns me, since his single,off-the-cuff remark, made from less-than-casual knowledge of the facts years afterwards, resulted in a feeding frenzy of murder theories, none of which hold any water at all.

"You can catch some of what I know about the case on A&E's Biography edition on Reeves, or on the Unsolved Myesteries episode, as well as on a wide variety of national and local entertainment-oriented programs. And you can check my other credentials at iMDB.com. All of this is submitted because you seem quite interested in seeing the Polish Brothers' film done right. I would be quite interested to see how they proceed. I've had numerous inquiries regarding the film rights to my book-in-progress over the years, and have always turned those inquiries away, feeling that the true story wasn't really movie material. And certainly I was not interested, in this particular case, in having a movie made of a book I hadn't finished.

"My only real concern here is that Reeves's story, if filmed, be honestly and truthfully done. He's not like Marilyn, there aren't going to be ten or fifteen films based on his life, each getting a shot at one version or another of the story. People who see a film on George Reeves are going to believe it, most likely. I'd hate for them to believe something false about this good and decent man whom I've come to know so well." -- Jim Beaver

Directed by Denzel

"I just saw Denzel Washington's ANTWONE FISHER, which, as you know, will be showing at the Toronto Film Festival. And I'm sorry, but aside from the fact that it's well made and is likely to be appreciated by, I suspect, predominantly African-American audiences, I hardly think it qualifies as a major or landmark artistic achievement.

"The only real things that it has going for it are the three-hanky ending and a promising performance from the young lead actor. Denzel plays Denzel-the-mentor competently but the subplot of his relationship with his wife is so perfunctory. Honestly I couldn't have cared less.

“The direction is competent but nothing special. Very much in a movie of the week type vein, I would say. It falls squarely in the sincere-but-kinda-dull category of FINDING FORRESTER and GOOD WILL HUNTING meets (egad) THE PRINCE OF TIDES … with a far less interesting narrative. I really wonder what all the fuss is about." -- Exhibitor Guy

Wells to Exhibitor Guy: The excitement on this end came from a hardcore script reader who read the Fisher script and thought it was damn good. He said he reads scores of scripts each year, and that this one stood out big-time. Well, it won’t be the first time somebody’s loved a script only to find … well, let’s wait until ANTWONE FISHER plays Toronto.

Role Playing

I always temporarily discontinue the games during a film festival, and since I'm leaving for the Toronto Film Festival next Wednesday and will be covering for 10 days hence, I'm just going to to post the first-timers next Wednesday and then shelve the games until my return from Toronto on Wednesday, 9.21.

Today's cast: Lolita Davidovich, Martin Landau, David Selby, Sharon Stone, Jenny Morrison, Richard Gere.

What's That Line?

Again, whoever identifies today's dialogue first will be celebrated next Wednesday, and then that's it for What's That Line? until the Toronto Film Festival is over and I'm back in L.A. and on a regular schedule.

A prosecutor is speaking to a plainclothes policeman in a government office building.

Prosecutor: Before we start, there's a wonderful quote. From a man named Thomas Da Quincy. He wrote…

[picks up book, begins reading]

"If once a man indulges in murder, very soon he comes to think little of robbing. And from robbing he comes next to drinking and sabbath-breaking, and from that to incivility and procrastination."

Name the film, the year of release, the director, the screenwriter(s), and at least one of the actors in the scene.