September 11, 2001 is now twenty-five years behind us, and for roughly a third of the country it is history rather than memory. What remains most accessible is the film record: the dramas, the documentaries, and the reconstructions that filmmakers have produced steadily since the towers came down. Some were made while the site was still being cleared. Others arrived a decade or two later, once distance made certain questions askable. They range from careful journalism to conventional studio filmmaking, and a few of them are difficult to sit through by design.
This guide covers sixteen of those films, dramas and documentaries both. Each entry offers a short review, a note on where the title can currently be streamed, rented, or found for free, and a plain assessment of whether it belongs in front of children.
Streaming rights shift often, particularly around the anniversary of 911, so a service streaming in the anniversary month of September may not be available in the months that follow. When a film has gone missing from its usual home, JustWatch or Reelgood will locate it in a few seconds.
A word on the family-viewing notes. Ratings alone are a poor guide when it comes to the subject of one of America’s greatest tragedies. A PG-13 film built around a child’s grief can be far harder on a young viewer than an R-rated war picture. We note what is actually difficult about each film rather than simply reiterating the rating.
The Day Itself – September 11, 2001
United 93 (2006)
Directed by Paul Greengrass. Rated R. 111 minutes.
Greengrass reconstructs the hijacking of Flight 93 and the confusion inside the FAA and NORAD in something close to real time, using unknown actors and, in several roles, the actual controllers and military personnel who lived through the morning. There are no speeches and no swelling score. The film simply proceeds, minute by minute, toward an ending everyone in the audience already knows. It won the New York Film Critics Circle award for best picture and remains the most disciplined and most honest of the narrative films about that day.
United is also the hardest to watch. Greengrass refuses to give the audience the release of heroism as it is normally packaged. The passengers are frightened people making a decision under conditions no one should face.
Where to watch: Available to rent or buy through Amazon Video, the Apple TV Store, and Fandango at Home. Subscription availability rotates; it has appeared on Netflix and on ad-supported services at various points.
Family viewing: Not for children. The R rating covers language and sustained terror rather than graphic violence, but the sense of dread is relentless. Reasonable for mature teenagers with an adult present and time afterward to talk. Younger than about fifteen, I would wait.
World Trade Center (2006)
Directed by Oliver Stone. Rated PG-13. 129 minutes.
Stone’s film follows two Port Authority police officers, John McLoughlin and Will Jimeno, who were buried in the concourse beneath the towers and pulled out alive. Actors Nicolas Cage and Michael Peña carry most of the picture from beneath rubble, in near darkness, which is a considerable feat of acting.
Stone, whose reputation suggested a different kind of movie entirely, made something restrained and traditional. The focus stays tight on two men, their wives, and the volunteers who found them.
The film has been criticized for sentimentality, and the criticism is not baseless. But it earns its emotion honestly, and it preserves a story of survival that would otherwise be a footnote.
Where to watch: Streaming on Peacock Premium, free with advertising on YouTube, and free with a library card through Kanopy. Also available to rent or buy through Amazon Video, Apple TV, and Fandango at Home.
Family viewing: The most approachable of the day-of dramas. The PG-13 rating reflects intense situations and some disturbing imagery rather than gore. Workable for viewers around thirteen and up. The claustrophobia of the rescue sequences is the main concern.
Flight 93 (2006)
Directed by Peter Markle. Made for A&E. Approximately 89 minutes.
Released a few months before Greengrass’s film and often confused with it, this made-for-television film takes the opposite approach. Where United 93 stays inside the aircraft and the control rooms, Flight 93 divides its attention between the plane and the families receiving phone calls at home. It is a smaller, plainer production, and the acting is uneven, but the domestic scenes give it a texture the theatrical film deliberately avoids. Several victims’ families cooperated with the production.
Where to watch: Available through Amazon Prime Video and other rental platforms. It surfaces periodically on ad-supported services and on A&E’s own channels around the anniversary.
Family viewing: Made for broadcast television, so the content is milder than the theatrical films. Still centered on a hijacking and the deaths of everyone aboard. Suitable for roughly thirteen and up.
Loss and Aftermath in the Wake of 911
The Guys (2002)
Directed by Jim Simpson. Rated PG. 84 minutes.
Adapted from Anne Nelson’s stage play and filmed within a year of the attacks, this is the earliest narrative film on the list and among the quietest. Anthony LaPaglia plays a fire captain who has lost most of his company and cannot find words for the eulogies. Sigourney Weaver plays the writer who helps him. That is the entire film: two people at a table, working through what to say about men who are gone.
Its theatrical origins are obvious and it is not cinematic in any conventional sense. It is, however, deeply moving, and it captures the specific paralysis of that autumn better than films made with a hundred times the budget.
Where to watch: The hardest title here to locate. It appears intermittently on rental platforms and ad-supported services, and used DVDs remain in circulation. Worth a search on JustWatch before assuming it is gone.
Family viewing: The mildest film on this list in terms of content, rated PG for language. The subject matter is grief rather than violence, and there is no depiction of the attacks. Appropriate for younger teenagers, though its extensive dialogue will lose most children.
Reign Over Me (2007)
Directed by Mike Binder. Rated R. 124 minutes.
Adam Sandler plays a man who lost his wife and three daughters on one of the planes and has since retreated into a shut-down existence of video games and headphones. Don Cheadle plays a former college roommate who recognizes him on the street. The film is about whether a person that damaged can be reached at all, and it does not promise that he can.
Sandler’s performance surprised most critics and holds up well. The film around it is uneven, with a subplot that does not work and a courtroom finale that strains, but the central relationship is worth the flaws.
Where to watch: Available to rent or buy through the major platforms. Subscription availability varies.
Family viewing: The R rating is for language and sexual references, and the language is heavy throughout. Adult viewing. Its portrait of unprocessed grief may also be difficult for anyone carrying a recent loss of their own.
Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close (2011)
Directed by Stephen Daldry. Rated PG-13. 129 minutes.
Adapted from Jonathan Safran Foer’s novel, this follows a nine-year-old boy searching New York for the lock that fits a key left behind by his father, who died in the towers. Tom Hanks and Sandra Bullock play the parents; Thomas Horn carries the film as the boy. It received a best picture nomination and a great deal of criticism, some of it deserved. The conceit is heavily literary and the film pushes hard for tears.
What redeems it is the specificity of the child’s experience. Roughly three thousand children lost a parent that day, and very few films have tried to sit inside that. This one does, and when it stops reaching for effect it is genuinely affecting.
Where to watch: Available on subscription through HBO Max at various points, and to rent or buy through Amazon, Apple TV, and Fandango at Home.
Family viewing: A misleading PG-13. Because the protagonist is a child, younger viewers identify closely, and the film includes recorded messages from the father as the towers burn. Those sequences are genuinely upsetting. I would not put this in front of a child under twelve, and I would watch alongside anyone younger than fifteen.
Worth (2020)
Directed by Sara Colangelo. Rated PG-13. 118 minutes.
Michael Keaton plays Kenneth Feinberg, the attorney appointed to administer the September 11th Victim Compensation Fund and forced to assign dollar values to human lives. Stanley Tucci plays Charles Wolf, a widower who organized opposition to Feinberg’s formula. The film is about the collision between an actuarial system and grieving families who will not be reduced to line items.
It is a talky, procedural picture, and it is the most adult film here in the useful sense of the word. Anyone who has dealt with an estate, an insurer, or a settlement will relate well to this film.
Where to watch: Streaming on Netflix.
Family viewing: Content is mild, with some strong language. The obstacle is interest rather than suitability. Older teenagers with a bent toward law or civics will find it substantial. Younger children will be bored within ten minutes.
Consequences
Zero Dark Thirty (2012)
Directed by Kathryn Bigelow. Rated R. 157 minutes.
Bigelow’s account of the decade-long hunt for Osama bin Laden, told largely through a composite CIA analyst played by Jessica Chastain. The opening minutes play emergency calls from the towers over a black screen, and the film proceeds from there through interrogation sites, embassy bombings, and finally the raid on Abbottabad.
The major motion picture provoked a serious argument about whether it endorses the interrogation program it depicts. Bigelow denied it; meanwhile, senators disputed the film’s accuracy. Viewers should know that the debate exists and is unresolved to this day. Setting that aside, it is a formidably made procedural, and the final raid sequence is a masterclass in sustained tension.
Where to watch: Rotates between subscription services including Netflix and Prime Video. Reliably available to rent or buy on the major platforms.
Family viewing: Adult viewing only. The film contains extended and graphic depictions of torture in its first half hour, plus heavy language and a prolonged night-vision assault. Not appropriate for anyone under seventeen.
12 Strong (2018)
Directed by Nicolai Fuglsig. Rated R. 130 minutes.
The true story of a Special Forces detachment inserted into northern Afghanistan weeks after the attacks, fighting alongside Northern Alliance forces and, because of the terrain, on horseback. Chris Hemsworth leads a cast that includes Michael Shannon, Michael Peña, and Taylor Sheridan.
This is the most conventional film on the list, a straightforward war picture with clear heroes and rousing music. The events depicted are extraordinary and largely unknown to the public, and the horse-cavalry-against-armor sequences are as remarkable as they sound.
Where to watch: Rotates among subscription services and is consistently available to rent or buy.
Family viewing: Rated R for war violence and language throughout. Combat is frequent though not especially gory by modern standards. Suitable for older teenagers, roughly seventeen and up, in households comfortable with war films.
The Report (2019)
Directed by Scott Z. Burns. Rated R. 118 minutes.
Adam Driver plays Daniel Jones, the Senate staffer who spent years assembling the intelligence committee’s investigation into the CIA’s post-9/11 interrogation program, and then fought to get it published. Annette Bening plays Senator Dianne Feinstein.
It is a film about reading documents in a windowless room, and it is far more gripping than that description suggests. It also functions as a direct counterweight to Zero Dark Thirty, which is almost certainly intentional. Watching the two in sequence is instructive, if grim.
Where to watch: Streaming on Amazon Prime Video.
Family viewing: The R rating is largely for language, but the film reconstructs interrogation sessions in disturbing detail. Adult viewing only. Politically-engaged older teenagers could potentially handle it with preparation.
Documentaries on 911
The Man Who Knew (2002)
Frontline, PBS. Unrated.
John O’Neill spent six years at the FBI pursuing al-Qaeda and warning anyone who would listen about bin Laden. He was regarded within the bureau as difficult, was pushed out, and took a job as head of security at the World Trade Center roughly two weeks prior to September 11. His body was recovered from a stairwell beneath the south tower.
Frontline’s account is careful, unsensational, and quietly devastating. It is the best short introduction to the intelligence failures that preceded the attacks.
Where to watch: Free on pbs.org and the PBS app, which is available on virtually every device. Also posted in full on Frontline’s YouTube channel.
Family viewing: Journalistic in tone with limited graphic content. Appropriate for students of high school age and a useful classroom resource.
The Saint of 9/11 (2006)
Directed by Glenn Holsten. Unrated. Approximately 90 minutes.
Father Mychal Judge was the Fire Department chaplain killed by falling debris while administering last rites in the north tower lobby. He was designated victim 0001. The documentary traces a complicated life: a Franciscan friar, a recovering alcoholic, a man who ministered to firefighters and to people with AIDS at a time when some clergy would not.
The film handles all of this with more grace than a summary suggests. The photograph of firefighters carrying his body from the rubble became one of the defining images of the day, and the documentary explains why the man in it mattered so much to so many.
Where to watch: Limited availability. Appears on rental platforms and occasionally on ad-supported services; DVDs remain obtainable. Some Catholic media services carry it around the anniversary.
Family viewing: Suitable for most teenagers. The film discusses Judge’s sexuality and his alcoholism frankly, which some families will want to know in advance. Some report that he was a gay man who kept his celibate vows. Content otherwise mild.
Boatlift (2011)
Directed by Eddie Rosenstein. Unrated. Approximately 12 minutes.
When the towers fell, hundreds of thousands of people fled south and discovered that Manhattan is an island. Within hours, ferries, tugs, dinner cruise boats, and private craft converged on the seawall and evacuated close to half a million people, the largest sea evacuation in history, organized on the fly by the people who happened to own boats. Tom Hanks narrates.
Twelve minutes long and the single most restorative thing on this list. If you watch nothing else this week, watch this.
Where to watch: Free on Kanopy with a library card, and posted in full on YouTube.
Family viewing: The most family-appropriate title here by a wide margin. Brief archival footage of the towers, but the film’s subject is people helping people. Suitable for children of roughly ten and up, and a good starting point for a family conversation.
Rebirth (2011)
Directed by Jim Whitaker. Unrated. Approximately 100 minutes.
Whitaker filmed five people connected to the attacks once a year for close to a decade, intercut with time-lapse photography of the site itself being cleared and rebuilt. A firefighter’s brother. A mother who lost her son. A young man badly burned. The structure lets you watch grief change shape over years rather than resolve in a third act, which is the honest depiction and a rare one.
The time-lapse footage of the site, taken from fixed cameras over ten years, is a quietly remarkable record in its own right.
Where to watch: Availability shifts. Has appeared on ad-supported services and on rental platforms; check JustWatch for the current home.
Family viewing: Content is mild, with the difficulty residing entirely in the emotional material. Appropriate for teenagers. Its patience will test younger viewers.
Children of 9/11: Our Story (2021)
Directed by Liz Mermin. Unrated. Approximately 120 minutes.
Also released as Generation 9/11. The film follows young people born in the months after the attacks to fathers who died in them, all of whom turned twenty around the time of filming. None of them met the parent they lost. The film watches them work out what that absence has meant, and it lets them arrive at different answers.
Commissioned by Channel 4, PBS, and ARTE France. Unsentimental and better for it.
Where to watch: Distributed through PBS in the United States. Check pbs.org and the PBS app, where availability varies by station and by window.
Family viewing: Appropriate for teenagers and arguably most valuable for them, since the subjects are close to their own age. Some strong language in the interviews. No graphic footage of the attacks.
Turning Point: 9/11 and the War on Terror (2021)
Directed by Brian Knappenberger. Five episodes. Rated TV-MA.
The broadest survey available. Knappenberger begins with the Soviet war in Afghanistan and runs through the rise of al-Qaeda, the attacks, the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, the interrogation program, and the long unraveling that followed. It draws on a wide range of interviews, including former officials and Afghans on the receiving end of American policy.
Critics generally described it as an even-handed history lesson rather than a source of revelations, and some viewers objected to its framing of the wars. It is a good choice for anyone who wants the full arc in one place, and it is a substantial commitment.
Where to watch: Streaming on Netflix.
Family viewing: TV-MA, and earned. Includes graphic footage from the attacks and from the wars, along with detailed discussion of torture. Adult viewing, or older teenagers watching with a parent. Best taken an episode at a time.
A Note on the 911 Anniversary
Knappenberger returned to the subject this year with Turning Point: Generation 9/11, a feature-length film that premiered on Netflix on September 2. It follows people who grew up in the aftermath, including children who lost parents and Marines who served during the withdrawal from Afghanistan. It is unrated and runs 97 minutes, and it makes a natural companion to the 2021 series and to Children of 9/11.
For families approaching this subject with children for the first time, the sequence that works best is Boatlift first, then World Trade Center, then, when the children are older, United 93. Begin with what people did for one another, an important legacy of 911.
