The Love We Make

On September 11, 2001, Paul McCartney was in New York, sitting in an airplane waiting for departure. Due to the attacks on the WTC, the pilot turned around; the passengers could see the burning towers from the plane's windows. The former Beatle describes his reaction in an interview: "Like everyone else, I thought I want to do something. But I'm not a fireman, I'm not a rescue worker, so there's no point in me going down there. I've got to think of something else." That impulse led to the Concert for New York, held in October 2001: a monumental benefit concert for the rescue workers who were still working through the rubble and an homage to their fallen brothers. Legendary documentary filmmaker Albert Maysles, who already made a film about The Beatles in 1964 when they first came to America, follows McCartney during the weeks leading up to the concert. In his customary unobtrusive style, he shows McCartney practicing with his band, giving interviews to promote the event, and backstage during the concert, where celebrities like Jim Carrey and Bill Clinton drop into his dressing room. Maysles's grainy black-and-white images are intercut with color footage of the concert. While it's unclear why the material was shelved for 10 years, its release on the 10th anniversary of the attacks is fitting: it's a testament to the hope that existed side by side with fear and anger in those first weeks after the attacks.