Reviews
The Reflecting Pool
By Joel S. Hirschhorn
Online Journal Contributing Writer


Apr 3, 2008, 00:28

Whether you see yourself as a truth seeker, patriotic American, independent thinker or voter, or just someone with bad memories of 9/11, you should make an effort to view The Reflecting Pool, a new independent movie. It is not about 9/11. It is about the credibility of the official government story about 9/11. Though a drama, it is based on meticulously researched facts about 9/11 as revealed in the bonus material on the DVD.

The story is about the search for truth and the unsettling implications of discovering 9/11 truth that conflicts with what has become the folklore about the historic event.

The plot follows the efforts of independent journalist Alex Prokop and Paul Cooper, a researcher and father of a 9/11 victim, to piece together fact-fragments into a picture that ultimately implicates the US government in the attacks. The horror of this revelation rivals the horror of the 9/11 events themselves, especially when we realize that far more people, especially American soldiers, have died because of 9/11 in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan than on 9/11. Yet to close our eyes to this truth makes us co-conspirators in one of the world�s most devilish and despicable events.

And that is the dilemma that viewers face after they watch this disturbing docudrama: What if this fictional story actually and accurately describes how our government played a role in causing 9/11?

Writer/Director Jarek Kupsc plays Alex Prokop who examines a mysterious 9/11 videotape revealing new information on the attack. Joseph Culp appears as Paul Cooper, the man who sent the tape and whose daughter died on 9/11. Though skeptical of conspiracy theories and fearful that it will jeopardize his career, Prokop agrees to take on the story with encouragement from his magazine editor and a former Gulf War correspondent, McGuire, played by Lisa Black.

The film follows Prokop and Cooper, especially as they investigate one of the great mysteries of 9/11: the inexplicable collapse of the 47-story World Trade Center Building 7, not hit by any airplane. They uncover the illegal destruction of physical evidence from Ground Zero, and discover information that the White House knew an attack was imminent. The team spends two weeks in New York and Washington, D.C., interviewing people and discovering damning information never mentioned in the 9/11 Commission Report. The FBI becomes involved, the magazine's corporate investors threaten to kill the entire story, and Prokop is attacked by a lawsuit and the media in an effort to discredit his story. Why?

Because the official version as presented in the 9/11 Commission Report purposely ignored or omitted vital evidence and testimonies to protect people in the Bush administration. Prokop, plagued by the ghosts of his childhood in Russia and trying to uphold the independence of American journalism, struggles to come to grips with this awful truth. The film illustrates that, as so often is the case, the truth does not set you free; it ties your stomach and conscience into knots. It will remind you of All the President�s Men and JFK, films that also used drama to pursue political truths.

The DVD is available for only $15 and you will want to lend it to friends and family or give as a gift, which is made especially attractive with even lower prices for packs of five or 10 DVDs. An extended trailer is also available at. Details about the film and its actors are at IMDb.

Video rental outlets like Blockbuster, Hollywood Video, Netflix and Redbox should make this DVD available. Otherwise, it is further evidence that status quo thinking is subverting 9/11 truth to the detriment of American democracy. Public libraries should also stock this important educational film. Once you watch it, you, too, will feel strongly about it reaching a wide audience.

Warning: No matter what you know or think you know about 9/11, this movie will rattle your brain, make you think, and perhaps keep you up at night.

Joel S. Hirschhorn was a senior staffer for the U.S. Congress for 12 years, is a co-founder of Friends of the Article V Convention, and the author of Delusional Democracy -- Fixing the Republic Without Overthrowing the Government.