By Jason Apuzzo. The Wall Street Journal’s Speakeasy blog reports today on a new documentary called Please Remove Your Shoes, about the troubled state of the Transportation Security Agency (TSA).
Please Remove Your Shoes follows the efforts of six whistleblower employees trying to fix what has obviously become – particularly in the wake of the Christmas bomber episode – an increasingly porous security situation at our nation’s airports.
According to the film’s website, the documentary “examines the period before 911 and the current situation nine years later and asks the questions that makes Washington squirm: ‘Are we really any better for all our money spent? Or is it safe to say that nothing has changed?'”
The driving force behind the project is retired pilot Fred Gevalt, who was himself flying a plane into New York on the morning of 9/11 – and was apparently 20 miles out of LaGuardia airport when the attack took place.
According to Speakeasy:
The final production, which Gevalt is self distributing July 1, asks viewers to evaluate if the TSA has truly made flying the friendly skies any safer post 9/11, and features interviews with Congressmen James Oberstar and John Mica (both of whom are on the Committee of Transportation and Infrastructure), as well as a number of former TSA and FAA employees. Gevalt adds that it wasn’t easy finding enough subjects to speak about their relationship with the TSA on the record, but as one interview beget another, “the business of access became less difficult.”
In a review of the film by Manhattan Movie Magazine, Lita Robinson writes: “Through extensive interviews with ex-Air Marshals, government officials and reporters, this documentary examines the advent of the Transportation Safety Administration (TSA) in the wake of 9/11, painting a disturbing picture of waste, inefficiency, and abuse of power. The former Marshals, several of whom have specific expertise in aviation-based terrorism, describe a ‘nonexistent’ security system before 9/11, and a bureaucratic nightmare after.”
We’ve all become accustomed to the bizarre situation at our nation’s airports – a situation in which passengers are asked to perform something akin to a highly ritualized Japanese tea ceremony of removing our shoes, bowing respectfully before our superiors, and speaking in low, formalized tones professing our innocence (“No, I’m not carrying plastic explosives in my contact lens case”) … all the while never feeling that we’re any safer. If Mr. Gevalt’s film can in any way improve this situation – and improve our security – then we wish him the very best with it. It’s a pity to me that this documentary is being self-distributed, due to the extremely important subject matter – and the fact that the film appears to have good production values and feature credible experts on the situation. But such is typically the fate of whistleblowers who buck the system. Feel free to visit the film’s official website for more information.
Posted on June 22nd, 2010 at 3:25pm.
