Perfunctory conspiracy theory slathered and drowned in conjecture? Yes, there’s plenty of conjecture, the same type of pedestrian and Fox-newsian we-report-you-decide type of inference that inflict the intellectual with vomit-inducing aversion. But the arguments presented in the documentary, Loose Change Second Edition, are compelling to say the least.
This review may be getting ahead of itself. First let’s begin with what Loose Change is. Loose Change is a documentary about the events leading up to and following the 9/11 attacks, but tries to prove that the attacks are a self-inflicted wound. The documentary is extremely low budget, which may be an explanation for the title, but with all the editing software one can crack freely on the web, the execution of the editing borders on brilliant and, despite all the stills and screen-shots of news websites, becomes quickly immersive.
The writer/director Dylan Avery, a young and inexperienced producer of such films, seems to borrow presentation techniques from Michael Moore. Whether you agree with Moore or not, you must admit that he has talent for pulling the spectator into his subject matter. Just think of his blanking the screen and only letting the viewer listen to the attack in Fahrenheit 9/11.
Avery does the same. Once you get over his obviously youthful and unrefined or unsophisticated come-as-you-are attitude, you get pulled in. The subject is intense and controversial — that always helps -- but he succeeds in not sounding like a wacko conspiracy theorist. Avery sounds intelligent and in possession of his faculties. So you forge on.
The film looks into just about all the angles one can think of and digs into them with an unforgiving cadence. He doesn’t start with 9/11 itself and then spider outward with his debunking. Au contraire, he begins with Cuba in the 60s and plans by the American government to crash drone planes in Cuba and then claim a passenger plane filled with students was shot down by the Cubans. Plans that were derogated by Kennedy who soon fired Lyman Lemnitzer, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, who came up with the plot.
Article comments
1 - dz
thanks for covering this subject matter.
2 - Dave
No biggie, you're welcome
3 - John
Thanks for reviewing this film. Stay tuned because "Loose Change 3" is coming out soon and it's supposed to clear up any inconsistancies as well as add more recently uncovered pieces of evidence. If just 10% of the claims are factual then we're in desperate need of a new investigation. Cheers!
4 - Quezinox
Thank you for the coverage. The next LC will cover the problems and blow everyone away!
5 - Vinnie S.
Typical review from a person who never took the time to notice that two of the supposed 9/11 are missing.
6 - Dave
There was more than one 9/11? And some are missing?
;-)
7 - Brainster
The film is nonsense from beginning to end. To take two points you discuss above, Lyman Lemnitzer was appointed Supreme Allied Commander of NATO by Kennedy after leaving the job of Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. And the cellphones issue is a canard; most of the phone calls were made from Airfones, those phones in the seatback in front of you.
8 - Dave
Jason I'm not advocating anything here, just reviewed a movie.
Take care to read the whole article before responding
9 - gru
Brainster,
I still have just one question:
if somebody attack 7/11 store, we can see video on TV, but if somebody attack pent, we can see
only couple blurry frames???
Please, explain it to me!
10 - How to Get the Girl of your Dreams
great movie. really makes you think. Many points are disputed, but does the job that a movie is supposed to.
11 - Mike
What disturbs me most about the responses for Loose Change 911 is how vehement and hostile they are in the face of what appears to be a viable argument for citizens to take a closer look at how their elected government leaders may be acting. The far (or neo-conservative) right has always been defensive and overly antagonistic in the face of criticism or alternate points of view. Perhaps Mr. Avery has uncovered a small piece of a larger puzzle which the neo-cons would prefer to keep secret in light of their real material motives in the Middle East and other oil producing nations.
12 - Mike
What disturbs me most about the responses for Loose Change 911 is how vehement and hostile they are in the face of what appears to be a viable argument for citizens to take a closer look at how their elected government leaders may be acting. The far (or neo-conservative) right has always been defensive and overly antagonistic in the face of criticism or alternate points of view. Perhaps Mr. Avery has uncovered a small piece of a larger puzzle which the neo-cons would prefer to keep secret in light of their real material motives in the Middle East and other oil producing nations.
13 - Michael J. West
The man did his homework. He piles the evidence on sharply and efficiently and doesn’t infer but states his opinion clearly for all to hear.
No, he doesn't. I'm no fan of Bush, Rumsfeld, or this needless, stupid war, but I've seen Loose Change and there's not a glimmer of "evidence." There's a great deal of speculation, unsourced (and extremely inaccurate) premises, and exactly zero information provided by experts, eyewitnesses, or participants--all of which are generally the things you'd consider "evidence." He presents pictures, film, and graphics where this or that is present and/or occurring, says, "What's happening here?" then, without asking anyone who might have an informed opinion on that, tells you himself exactly what's happening there without rational justification.
I'm all for skepticism about official accounts of 9/11, but Loose Change is nothing if not a setback for rational discourse about it.
14 - Joey
Loose Change is intelligent and eye opening. Even if you are skeptical, the evidence on the pentago and the twin towers is overwhelming and frightening.
300 plus fireman ran up the buildings with years of experience knowing the behaviour of fire and how it interacts with building materials and then we have the firemen clearly stating that they heard multiple explosions throughout the lower levels. The twin towers was designed to withstand hurricanes, earthquakes and airplanes crashes. Avionic Fuel burns and travels upwards, for it to travel down the building and burn metal and concrete requires a phenominal amount of oxygen to force the burning fuel down the buildings.
Ask me if I would listen to a Government official with information that is vague and incomplete or the firemen with years of experience and knowledge on the behaviour of fire and that they would distinguish whether those the explosions are gas related or implosions from within.
The information in Loose Change shows how gullible the US public can be. We've seen how buildings fall from newsreels of demolition jobs and yet the minds of the public through the manipulation of the media still believe it was the act of terrorists.
Cheers
Joey
15 - Michael J. West
Forgive me, but...
Loose Change is intelligent and eye opening.
Loose Change is not at all intelligent. It is poorly researched, grasps at straws, and invents "evidence" out of thin air.
Eye-opening, it is. It shows you how far people will go to perpetuate ignorant, bullshit theories.
Even if you are skeptical, the evidence on the pentago and the twin towers is overwhelming and frightening.
The evidence on the Pentagon and Twin Towers in Loose Change is nonexistent and half-assed.
300 plus fireman ran up the buildings with years of experience knowing the behaviour of fire and how it interacts with building materials and then we have the firemen clearly stating that they heard multiple explosions throughout the lower levels.
Actually, they clearly stated that there were secondary explosions throughout the lower levels. Which is neither uncommon in large fires nor evidence of controlled demolition. There is one quote given by a fireman saying "we think there were bombs in the building." That fireman threatened to sue the publication in question for misquoting him. Others said, "It was as if there had been a detonation," or "like a detonation." Similes, attempting to describe the way things looked and seemed. Not actual descriptions of what they believed happened. Saying that that means there was a detonation is akin to saying that because I say something happens "as if by magic," that therefore magic happened.
The twin towers was designed to withstand hurricanes, earthquakes and airplanes crashes.
They were designed to withstand 707 crashes at cruising speed - or so it's been said. (Nobody's actually produced any documentation of the impact analysis, so we don't know what they were actually, specifically designed to withstand. Furthermore, at the time that the WTC was actually designed, the technology and ability to conduct full-scale simulations of the aircraft impact, the growth and spread of the ensuing fires, and the effects of fires on the structure didn't really exist. All they could do was speculate.) The planes that hit the WTC were 767s, 20% larger than 707s, and were traveling substantially faster than cruising speed. Which gives them much greater momentum, which makes it pretty much meaningless to measure them against 707s at cruising speed.
Avionic Fuel burns and travels upwards, for it to travel down the building and burn metal and concrete requires a phenominal amount of oxygen to force the burning fuel down the buildings.
It didn't burn metal and concrete. Nor did it travel downward. Who said it did?
Ask me if I would listen to a Government official with information that is vague and incomplete or the firemen with years of experience and knowledge on the behaviour of fire and that they would distinguish whether those the explosions are gas related or implosions from within.
First of all, the firemen didn't say the implosions came from within. They didn't even suggest it. You'll notice that Loose Change uses footage from a different documentary, in which, as I mentioned above, they talk about what it LOOKED like and SEEMED like (not what it was). They weren't asked if they believed that the buildings came down by controlled demolition. But we do know from other interviews they've given that they DON'T believe that controlled demolition had anything to do with it.
The information in Loose Change shows how gullible the US public can be.
It certainly does. For one thing, it shows that people who want to believe that 9/11 was an inside job, will believe even the flimsiest and most cherry-picked evidence. For another, it shows that for all their claims about Americans not researching or applying critical thinking to the claims made by investigators, the 9/11 truthseekers are perfectly happy not to research or apply critical thinking to the claims made by Loose Change.
We've seen how buildings fall from newsreels of demolition jobs and yet the minds of the public through the manipulation of the media still believe it was the act of terrorists.
Perhaps because there are mountains and mountains of credible and indisputable evidence that it was the act of terrorists, and not a single shred of credible or viable evidence that it wasn't.
OK. I'm done.