vchimpanzee At first, I was expecting this movie to be about what happened on that terrible day. Although I have seen numerous documentaries, this was my first fictional TV-movie based on the events of 9-11. When it started several years in advance, I figured the movie would end with the day that changed America, and that we would see many of the events that led to what happened. A pilot did not seem to want to learn enough about flying, and this raised a red flag with his instructor. But then the time line advanced too quickly, and it was clear things were going to have to slow down a lot. They didn't, and the dark day came quickly. We saw a number of events in various parts of the country which related somehow to 9-11, but it took a while to figure out how they connected with each other. If one scene was true, there were people who knew how to stop the events from happening, but they didn't try hard enough. A connection was made to either September 11 or November 9, several weeks in advance.In Seattle, a female FBI agent played a role in stopping a group of people who might have been terrorists. She just happened to be the girlfriend of a man who spent most of the movie fighting in Afghanistan. I suppose the Afghanistan scenes had value, but that should probably have been a whole other movie.Admiral McKee, who had a major role in developing the Homeland Security department after the attacks, happened to have a daughter who was going to college at Berkeley, who knew a professor who was one of the many suspicious-acting people from the Middle East or nearby. Some of these people were perfectly innocent but ended up getting arrested or worse when we were unable to trust people who were 'different'.One character had a ticket on Flight 93, which crashed in Pennsylvania. I won't say whether the character made it onto the plane, but an effective scene with this character's family showed their reaction when the plane went down. One interesting scene showed a plane with problems that led the military to believe terrorists were on that plane. The unthinkable almost happened. This was quite interesting.After 9-11, we watched as various government agencies showed they were not prepared and made attempts to change that. We saw something taking place in Afghanistan, though exactly what wasn't clear. We saw the innocent and the possibly guilty being detained. We saw this tragedy from many different angles, maybe too many for this short a movie.And--this could be a SPOILER--No happy ending to this one.

goleafs84 "Homeland Security" wasn't the worst, but by the same token, wasn't all that great. I guess I expected a little better out of this, since the cast was pretty decent; Tom Skeritt (Picket Fences), Beth Broderick (Sabrina The Teenage Witch), Scott Glenn (Silverado and Backdraft) and Stephi Lineburg was good as Melissa McKee, Admiral McKee's (Skeritt) daughter.What I liked about it was the timeline from events leading to September 11th, 9/11 itself and the formation of the US Department of Homeland Security. I especially liked that they didn't dwell on 9/11, although it was a tragic event and what lead to the formation of the US Department Homeland Security, we all know what happened, lived through it and I didn't want to see a another long drawn out version of it. That would've been the easy thing to do.The problem I had with this show, is I'm trying to figure out what it's supposed to be. Is this a movie, a mini-series or a pilot to a new drama/action series? By the end of the show, there were many "loose ends" that needed to be tied, especially the final scene, but it looks like it won't be. I'm assuming that this was supposed to be a pilot to new series, NBC bought it, but changed their minds and scrapped it. * 1/2 out of 5 for being incomplete

lellison Being among the first to contribute to the user comments, I feel somewhat on thin ice on this one.I noticed on the comments threads that several viewers thought the timing was wrong for this subject, and that it was a Republican billboard during an election year. All that aside, I did watch the complete movie, despite the many commercial interruptions. Flow and continuity is important to any pseudo documentary (which is how I would classify this work), documentary, or docudrama. It was difficult enough following the many different locations and mini-plots. To accurately depict the depth and scope of this topic, much more time is needed, and the many commercial breaks would have to be eliminated, which obviously won't happen on a network movie. All of the historical events visited, although based in fact, were given only a token presentation, and were intertwined with fictional characters and plots.It is entirely possible that the writers of this movie were attempting to accurately show the progression of the Middle East terrorism threat from the early 90's through post 9/11. Unfortunately, the span of this topic just can't be fit into the traditional movie length. Think about doing justice to War And Peace or The Godfather in 90 minutes.The single redeeming part of this movie might be a rather corny and feeble attempt at showing all of us how the Department of Homeland Security was formed, it's makeup, and it's function. However, one would do better to pick up a copy of last week's Newsweek for a more fulfilling explanation.Reflecting back on this movie, I feel like I watched 7 years of history on a fast-forward videotape. We all know the historical facts quite well, and most of this was a review of the high and low points, spiced up (or down) with soap opera style emotional tidbits.Yes, if the purpose of this presentation is strictly entertainment, the timing is wrong (and always will be). If enlightenment is the target, it missed the mark and might stand accused of being sloppy historical revisionism. Politically, it did lean rather heavily toward the right. The historical time line is full of holes, which were plugged with emotional sugar lumps. Technically fairly well written, acted, and directed. I was comfortable with this movie right after watching it, but having written the preceding, I now am not very pleased with it. There's a bit too much of an Oliver Stone undercurrent. Take it with a grain of salt, and don't expect too much.

dragoneyez01 Why must every network jump the gun in releasing tv-movies based on recent events. First there was the DC sniper movie. Then you have the Lacy Peterson movie. Both of which came out BEFORE the trials had been completed. And now, barely two years after 9/11, we have a 9/11 movie. Before the (un-necessary) War in Iraq and the abandoned War on Terror (or, according to our esteemed Mr. Bush, "War on Terra") have even accomplished their goals, before the investigation of the government's mess-ups has been completed, and long before the conspirators behind the attacks have been brought to justice (I'm even starting to doubt they'll ever be brought to justice).Anyway, network greed and my own personal opinions on the events don't have any bearing on this movie. So, I digress and must comment on the movie.All things considered, the plot of the movie goes all over the place. The direction and writing is short-sighted at best. We're given various twisting plotlines, that, by the end of the movie, leave tons of loose ends with no real solution (maybe its because the real-life plotlines haven't found a solution either...).We're presented with Scott Glenn, a veteran FBI or CIA or something agent, who's on the border of retirement. Following 9/11 those plans go out the window (obviously). We're also shown another CIA agent, Marisol Nichols (most notably the scatter brained Griswold daughter in 'Vegas Vacation'), who's on stake-out outside a terrorist hide out. Needless to say, the FBI rains on her parade and kills one of her suspects. But, she takes the other one, giving the FBI a friendly greeting as she goes. Then we have Beth Broderick (the aunt of MJH in 'Sabrina: The Teenage Witch') and Tom Skerritt, who's daughter almost gets on one of the doomed planes. We are also shown various scenes from Afghanistan, which contribute almost nothing to the failing plot. Thankfully NBC didn't completely sell their soul to the devil. They didn't actually show planes crashing into buildings... just news footage of smoking buildings.Overall, this is a short-signed, quickly done, low budget movie that tries to capitalize on fear and headlines: stock footage, low grade actors, and all. I guess I could've forgiven the greedy pigs at NBC, had they not further trivialized the events by including product placement (don't we all want to chug Minute Maid Orange juice when we find out girlfriend might be dead?).I doubt NBC, or any other network, will re-air this turkey. But, if by chance they do, skip this. Well, unless you do want to see your two/three-year old nightmares interpreted by a bunch of greedy network execs and thrown back at you.Rating: 3/10