Blocking the Path to 9/11 (2008)

Touches You

Best movie ever!

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

In 2006, ABC/Disney surprised the world by announcing a miniseries called The Path to 9/11 to be broadcast on the fifth anniversary of the terrorist attacks, based on several books, including, prominently, the 9/11 Commission Report. Opposition began immediately. The project was maligned by the mainstream media and pressure was brought to bear because the miniseries took a hard look at the lack of response between the 1993 World Trade Center bombing and the 9/11 attacks. Remember, those years included the Khobar Towers, the U.S.S. Cole, and the African embassy bombings—and that's just the attacks on American interests. During that time, all over the world, the jihadists were blowing things up, and Bill Clinton was asleep at the switch. The miniseries, condensing the voluminous matter coming out of the 9/11 Commission, and including other authoritative sources, promised to be a bombshell in itself. But the series almost didn't broadcast. Bill Clinton himself demanded changes to the completed film and a number of politicians—none of whom had seen the film, mind you—attacked it. And ABC caved, deleting entire scenes, truncating others, and running a disclaimer. The series, designed to run every year on September 11th, ran just once. It never aired again and was never released on DVD.Blocking the Path to 9/11: An Anatomy of a Smear details what happened in the aftermath of this debacle. The miniseries itself was billed as a "docudrama," indicating that certain liberties were taken with presentation. In Blocking, it is clear from interviews with the participants that they were just trying to tell the truth about the lead-up to 9/11, to "connect the dots" as so many accused the Bush administration of failing to do. Unfortunately for the Left, there were only a few new dots to connect during Bush's few months in office, but a whole mess of them were ignored during Bill Clinton's tenure. A growing sense of horror builds as you watch Blocking. The main writer, Iranian-born American Cyrus Nowrasteh, has a formidable pedigree in the film business, as does director David Cunningham. But nevertheless, they soon became marked men for their temerity in trying to tell us what happened prior to the attacks. Blocking the Path details how craven Disney was in bowing to pressure from the politicians they helped elect. Several scenes are shown with the excised material intact. The one that stands out most is a moment when the Northern Alliance fighters in Afghanistan have Osama bin Laden in their sights, the target painted with lasers, and American fighters above, their thumbs poised to fire missiles, awaiting a kill order that never comes. The national security team, including heads of the FBI and CIA and the president's own national security adviser, all agree that bin Laden must go, but no one has the courage to give the order. And Bill Clinton? He's upstairs in the White House residence and won't come down to take the phone call and make a decision. For two hours they wait and he never arrives. Finally, the operation is canceled. As the leader of the rebels leaves, he says to the CIA operative, "Are there any men left in America?" The gainsayers of this episode say things didn't happen exactly that way. Nowrasteh responds that maybe that is true, but they had thirteen such opportunities to kill bin Laden, and for the purposes of the film, they collapsed them into one. All the elements in the edited scene were factual. That's thirteen chances to avoid 9/11, folks. Thirteen. Talk about an unlucky number. And that's really the crux of the so far successful attempts to derail The Path to 9/11. Though millions of people saw the two-night series broadcast, they didn't see the version that was approved by the phalanx of ABC/Disney lawyers and researchers prior to the filming. But when pressure against the film began to be felt, ABC/Disney caved for no other reason than to spare the person most responsible for 9/11—William Jefferson Clinton.Blocking the Path leaves the viewer stunned. Every fact need not be unassailable for you to realize that those charged with protecting us failed miserably and are still trying to cover up their malfeasance with help from the very people who are supposed to defend free speech.As stated, The Path to 9/11 is still unavailable on DVD. Imagine spending $40 million and not wanting to recoup your investment. When a group of investors at a Disney shareholder meeting challenged the company to either release the film or sell it to someone who would, the CEO responded that he knew of no one interested in buying it. The investors immediately made an offer, which Disney refused. Mickey Mouse is indeed a rat. Note: You can sign a petition to encourage ABC/Disney to make The Path to 9/11 available at www.ipetitions.com/petition/thepathto911 He who controls the media controls history.

This documentary lays out the hard facts, and it should disturb all Americans who believe in freedom of speech. The "Path to 9/11" docudrama was suppressed by political censorship. This is on the record. Prominent Senators wrote to ABC and threatened the "review" their broadcast license. Mainstream Democrats jumped on whatever platforms they could and demanded the series not be run. It ended up being cut until the Clintons were satisfied. ABC forfeited the sponsors, and then ran it a single time, and never again, and a DVD was never released. Isn't this all just a little bit weird? Can you imagine George Bush demanding that a movie company change its portrayal of him? Do you think anyone in Hollywood would listen to him if he tried it? This is naked American political censorship, and we've let it happen with nary a word of protest.To be clear, "Path to 9/11" was NOT intended as a hit piece against the Clintons. It was also, contrary to claims made by Democrats, very well documented and vetted. It pointed out problems in both the Clinton and Bush administrations. They production team was not particularly "conservative", and in fact they were of the opinion that the political fallout would be a big embarrassment to George Bush (since Clinton was out of office and out of focus, whereas Bush was on the job and could be damaged). And ABC is not a producer of conservative propaganda.The vital warning of "Path to 9/11" was that political considerations caused America to turn a blind eye to a real military threat. So there's a terrible irony in political considerations causing America to suppress the warning that political considerations made us vulnerable to 9/11 in the first place.

First of all, I am not a crazy political junkie. Just trying to stay informed and aware of media around me. All Americans should see this film, no matter if you're leaning left, right, libertarian, democrat or republican. What an eye-opener. Believe it or not, there is censorship right here in the USA! Watch this, and you can decide. This is about rich & powerful democrats using their connections to block/censor the ABC mini-series. It was shown in an edited version in Sept 2006. But, there will never be a DVD for "Path to 9/11" released. Too bad! You can get any junk TV shows on DVD, as long as it's not anti-establishment. You can decide for yourself after seeing this.

This is a film that all American should see.We might like to believe that this sort of thing cannot happen here, but it can and did.I personally hope that the careers of all the courageous filmmakers have not been too badly damaged, but I fear that they have.We support the right of Oliver Stone to make "W" which he has admitted is a creative work, designed around certain published facts...but the DOCU-DRAMA "The Path to 9/11" was attacked with a fervor that would've made the former Soviets proud.I want to thank the makers of this film and the original film it is about for their courage under fire.