How is suspense created in 'UNITED 93'?

The film we watched in class was called UNITED 93, which was based on the events of the September 11th 2001 bombing that occurred in America. The film starts of with the terrorists getting ready for their flight and this is shown in quite slow motion which helps the audience to see what is going on more. The digetic sounds that sound like steady heartbeats are included in this scene too which gets
the audience nervous because the heartbeats sound as though they are the
terrorists' heartbeats, connoting that they are about to do something that is wrong and suggests a feeling that they are quite scared.

The whole film is a build up to the main event which is the bombings. There are four planes and the film was based around the fourth bombing which failed. There is cross-cuts throughout the whole film from the US Air Traffic Forces and the people boarding the plane. This shows that they are connected in someway which hints out to the audience that something will happen to the plane.

The atmosphere of the Air Traffic Forces were very busy with many computers and distant chattering. This is contrasted with the much quieter and peaceful atmosphere of the people in the plain. The fact that the terrorist looked very nervous gave a huge impact on the audience as they will be feeling very nervous too because they would not want them to go ahead with their plan. Shots are shown of many people talking to their loved ones or about their loved ones which brings a sense of sympathy as the audience will feel sorry for them as they will think that they may not see their loved ones again.

The film drags on a lot to help build suspense. The film does not go straight into the bombings but prepares the audience for that big, epic moment. This enables the audience to keep watching as the suspense created by small actions will encourage the audience to wait until the moment arrives. When one of the terrorist goes inside the bathroom and prepares a bomb which he later attaches to his body, this pops up a question in the audiences heads as to whether this is the moment and
whether he will press the button that sets the bomb off and when? This follows onto the moment where he stabs a passenger. This makes the audience shocked and scared to find out what he will do next. So suspense arrives at this moment because it is eventually coming up to the big moment and the shock portrays a tense mood because the audience will be very sad to see this and would not want to see it happening to all the passengers.

When the Air Traffic Forces wait silently to see
whether the two planes that is seen on their computers to crash each other, this causes suspense. The atmosphere there is mainly busy, so having silence shows tension and nerves as to whether the planes will crash. This makes the audience look at the screen very closely watching the two planes just like the characters in the scene.

Suspense is created also when the passengers try to make their plan to help the plain to land safely by gaining control of the terrorists. This makes the audience think whether this will work. Suspense is created when the passengers are saying goodbye to their loved ones in case they do no make it out alive. This makes the audience very emotional and makes them feel nervous and want the passengers to stay alive. As the big male passengers try to take control of the plane with a pilot and director in their team, this makes the plane go wobbly and this part is one of the main scenes in which it gets the audience tensed because the plane is shown heading downwards very fast and this connoted that they have very little time to save the plane. In the end, before the plane crashed, the screen goes blank which immediately makes the audience think what did happen? Did they crash? For a few seconds many questions pop up in the audiences heads and they are left in suspense until further information pops up with the shocking news that the plane crashed and that 'no one survived'. At this point, the suspense is over but leaves the audience feeling very emotional and shocked.

I thought the film was very good at creating suspense because the whole film builds up to that one moment and leaves the audience waiting. I found the film very emotional and nerve racking as I did not know what was going to happen next. Throughout the whole film, the audience knew something terrible would happen, but the suspense created made the audience always question when?