is that it comes from the Daily Mail - the Fox News of British newspapers. Known for their breathtaking racism and homophobia, I would look very carefully at the actual data on this as they loathe the Labour government and do anything in their power to discredit them.

The myopia of a lot of Americans about this film continues to be incredibly irritating. I think a previous poster hit the nail on the head when he said that there are large sections of the American population who somehow view the horrible events of 9/11 as being sacrosanct purely because it happened to Americans.

The rest of the world gets that you are the post powerful country, but that does not make your lives or your history more untouchable than any other nations tragedies, which your film industry has plundered for brainless romances, action films and epics for decades. And I say this as largely a supporter of America. I doubt any cinema goers in the States watched the trailer for Poseidan, and shouted “Too Soon!” when they saw footage of a giant tsunami – I doubt they even thought about the 250,000 people who were killed less than two years ago.

As brutal as it sounds, the reason that this film is made is because the story of what may have happened on that plane is fascinating. At least have the courage to admit that if this story was about a British flight and British passengers, most of the objections would be silenced and people would see this as a potentially thrilling action movie.

I would just like to add for those who are attacking Greengrass’ intentions, I believe that he is about as far away from a rabid Fox News yokel as you can get. His film based on Bloody Sunday is just as good as Stephanie says it is. It’s enormously powerful and brilliantly made. In all of his interviews, he has come across as calm, rigorous in his attempts at fairness and clear-sighted about the events and his interpretation of them. This isn’t something I would say about a lot of filmmakers, but I believe him to have honourable intentions.

I have to admit to having a problem with this letter. I am currently locked in an argument with a friend of mine who is a writer. He has written a drama script in which the main action of the first episode takes place in the house of a gay couple. The party scene is dripping with stereotypes, many of them of the longest running kind about gay men (immature, sex and looks crazed, predatory). It is for Irish television which has virtually no representations of modern gay Irish life (it has imports of Will and Grace and British soap operas to boost is gay quota). He sees no problem in this, yet I read it with horror.

And yet, this letter, which plays on all sorts of 'tragic gay' melodramatics, doesn't make me any happier. I am a 24 year old gay man - hugely lucky to be living in a time and a city (London) which is more accepting than at any other time in modern history. I have had a glass bottle smashed over my head for being gay, but have also experienced the amazing sense of family and community from gay men and women who have learned long ago to construct and re-interpret family.

I loathe using the term, but gay people will never move from being largelt tolerated to true acceptance until there is a plurality of representations of them in pop media. There is a place for the comedy of Leno and the tragedy of Brokeback Mountain but too often these two poles have come to represent that community in the media. Being gay is about more than Folsom and Judy, more than Kylie and Joe Orton and all the other camp/tragic touchstones.

When I think of gay people, I don't just think of those I know who have died of AIDS, or who have been driven to suicide. I think of my wonderful friends, my rich life and heritage which I am only now beginning to explore.

so I think I did a little of all three - really inspiring!

I usually enjoy Stephanie's reviews - even when I disagree vehemently with them (as I did, for example with Superman Returns) I respect her reasoning.

However, one particular line in this review stopped me short -

"But if movies about 9/11 have to be made at all -- and no one has yet answered the question, for me, at least, of why we should need or want them just yet"

You know what, I haven't heard a convincing argument why movies about 9/11 should NOT be made, that doesn't sound like hypocritical American insularism. It was five years ago - there were films made about other 20th century disasters and wars while they were going on, or in the immediate aftermath. Why should 9/11 get special treatment? To me, its just another example of American chauvinism - their culture will happily leech off the tragedies of other countries but agonise over their own. Either grow a spine about the whole thing or don't watch.