ABSTRACT
Excalibur when the fog rises, helpfully obscuring the small number of King Arthur’s army of shadows; it’s part of Boorman’s intelligent use of national mythology. Stone has dared not to distance himself from the immediacy of 9/11; he’s willing to countenance contemporary historical mythologizing, insisting that we are ready to see and assess the felt consequences of what’s happened to us. World Trade Center reminds us, though in a less philological way than Excalibur, that movie culture has a commemorative and restorative purpose.
