http://dailynews.yahoo.com/h/eo/20020206/en/eye_s_eyewitness_wtc_attack_video_1.html
Eye's Eyewitness WTC Attack Video
Just when you thought you couldn't take one more viewing of the planes smashing into the Twin Towers comes this news: The Eye network has secured the rights to eyewitness video taped inside the World Trade Center during the September 11 terrorist attack.
CBS will edit the exclusive footage, including 45 minutes revealing the chaos and rescue efforts inside the North Tower as the South Tower collapsed, into an as-yet untitled two-hour prime-time special. It will air on 9 p.m. ET/PT on March 10--a date the network states is coincidental, but which happens to almost coincide with the sixth-month anniversary of the tragedy.
"It's an amazing chronicle of history from a perspective nobody has seen," says Susan Zirinsky, a CBS news producer in charge of the special, which is being created under the aegis of the entertainment division.
Asked if the special would air with or without commercial interruption, a CBS spokesman said that decision had not been reached, but discussions were underway with some possible sponsors. (Another job for the bowing-down Budweiser Clydesdales that appeared during the Super Bowl, perhaps?) CBS is contributing all funds from the broadcast to the Uniformed Firefighters Association Scholarship Fund to benefit the children of the firefighters who died in the attack.
The video, described by CBS president Les Moonves as "just phenomenal material," was captured by French brothers Jules and Gedeon Naudet, who were downtown that morning to film a documentary about the New York Fire Department. They shot footage of the first plane slamming into the South Tower and then headed into what became Ground Zero, camera rolling.
The footage is purportedly not gory, but includes identifiable images of firefighters who entered the building never to come out alive. According to The New York Times, the images are "raw", showing faces filled with fear. The smoky atmosphere inside the building made some "images seem as if they are underwater," the Times reports. Screams are heard on the soundtrack as the South Tower collapses.
"It is inspiring and important," says Zirinsky. "It's powerful. It's not hard to watch; it's just mesmerizing." She believes the audience will come away with a new perspective on the heroism of the firefighters and that this "unique piece of work," will "allow people to sit back and take a breath, six months after, and really look with awe at the inside story of Ground Zero."
Although the footage has not been aired before, the videomakers' story is chronicled in the March issue of Vanity Fair, whose editor Graydon Carter knew the Naudets' father. Carter in turn contacted his friend Jim Wiatt, head honcho at the powerful William Morris Agency, who then contacted his chum, Moonves. Thus, the highly coveted footage ended up at CBS, where it will air one time in the special, which lists Carter and David Friends, Vanity Fair's editor of creative development, as executive producers. The Naudets, who will be paid to work on the special, retain rights to their footage for international distribution, home video and DVD. They also will be completing their original three-hour documentary on the New York firefighters.
Pete Gorman, president of the Uniformed Fire Officers Association, told the Hollywood Reporter he might express informal concerns to CBS. He had not seen the video and planned to talk to those who had before contacting the network.
Zirinisky says the network has been in touch with a woman who "sort of represents the families, and everybody know's we're doing this," so she didn't foresee any problems.
In the wake of the Super Bowl's musical and commercial tributes, September 11 is now clearly moving beyond the realm of news into entertainment. NBC has plans for a memorial special. HBO is at work on a documentary titled In Memoriam: September 11, 2001, New York City, in collaboration with NYC's former mayor Rudy Giuliani and his police and fire department commissioners. The HBO doc combines amateur and independent professional stills and video, along with television station footage, in what is described as "the people's film." HBO profits will also go to the families of police officers, firefighters and emergency workers.
Giuliani, who was downtown when the Twin Towers collapsed, told a gathering of television writers last month that the HBO documentary conveys "what it felt like to be in the middle of it, particularly those big clouds rushing through the canyons of the city."
"I think it's really important to have an accurate, historical recitation of what happened so that people--not only right now while this memory is fresh for us all, and very dramatic and very emotional, but 10 and 15 and 20 and 30 years from now---can understand what happened," Giuliani said.
Eye's Eyewitness WTC Attack Video
Just when you thought you couldn't take one more viewing of the planes smashing into the Twin Towers comes this news: The Eye network has secured the rights to eyewitness video taped inside the World Trade Center during the September 11 terrorist attack.
CBS will edit the exclusive footage, including 45 minutes revealing the chaos and rescue efforts inside the North Tower as the South Tower collapsed, into an as-yet untitled two-hour prime-time special. It will air on 9 p.m. ET/PT on March 10--a date the network states is coincidental, but which happens to almost coincide with the sixth-month anniversary of the tragedy.
"It's an amazing chronicle of history from a perspective nobody has seen," says Susan Zirinsky, a CBS news producer in charge of the special, which is being created under the aegis of the entertainment division.
Asked if the special would air with or without commercial interruption, a CBS spokesman said that decision had not been reached, but discussions were underway with some possible sponsors. (Another job for the bowing-down Budweiser Clydesdales that appeared during the Super Bowl, perhaps?) CBS is contributing all funds from the broadcast to the Uniformed Firefighters Association Scholarship Fund to benefit the children of the firefighters who died in the attack.
The video, described by CBS president Les Moonves as "just phenomenal material," was captured by French brothers Jules and Gedeon Naudet, who were downtown that morning to film a documentary about the New York Fire Department. They shot footage of the first plane slamming into the South Tower and then headed into what became Ground Zero, camera rolling.
The footage is purportedly not gory, but includes identifiable images of firefighters who entered the building never to come out alive. According to The New York Times, the images are "raw", showing faces filled with fear. The smoky atmosphere inside the building made some "images seem as if they are underwater," the Times reports. Screams are heard on the soundtrack as the South Tower collapses.
"It is inspiring and important," says Zirinsky. "It's powerful. It's not hard to watch; it's just mesmerizing." She believes the audience will come away with a new perspective on the heroism of the firefighters and that this "unique piece of work," will "allow people to sit back and take a breath, six months after, and really look with awe at the inside story of Ground Zero."
Although the footage has not been aired before, the videomakers' story is chronicled in the March issue of Vanity Fair, whose editor Graydon Carter knew the Naudets' father. Carter in turn contacted his friend Jim Wiatt, head honcho at the powerful William Morris Agency, who then contacted his chum, Moonves. Thus, the highly coveted footage ended up at CBS, where it will air one time in the special, which lists Carter and David Friends, Vanity Fair's editor of creative development, as executive producers. The Naudets, who will be paid to work on the special, retain rights to their footage for international distribution, home video and DVD. They also will be completing their original three-hour documentary on the New York firefighters.
Pete Gorman, president of the Uniformed Fire Officers Association, told the Hollywood Reporter he might express informal concerns to CBS. He had not seen the video and planned to talk to those who had before contacting the network.
Zirinisky says the network has been in touch with a woman who "sort of represents the families, and everybody know's we're doing this," so she didn't foresee any problems.
In the wake of the Super Bowl's musical and commercial tributes, September 11 is now clearly moving beyond the realm of news into entertainment. NBC has plans for a memorial special. HBO is at work on a documentary titled In Memoriam: September 11, 2001, New York City, in collaboration with NYC's former mayor Rudy Giuliani and his police and fire department commissioners. The HBO doc combines amateur and independent professional stills and video, along with television station footage, in what is described as "the people's film." HBO profits will also go to the families of police officers, firefighters and emergency workers.
Giuliani, who was downtown when the Twin Towers collapsed, told a gathering of television writers last month that the HBO documentary conveys "what it felt like to be in the middle of it, particularly those big clouds rushing through the canyons of the city."
"I think it's really important to have an accurate, historical recitation of what happened so that people--not only right now while this memory is fresh for us all, and very dramatic and very emotional, but 10 and 15 and 20 and 30 years from now---can understand what happened," Giuliani said.
