LOS ANGELES: Ken Nacke approached the private screening of United 93 at a Newark, New Jersey, movie theatre on Saturday with more than a little trepidation. It’s not every day you sit down in a darkened room and watch your brother die.

“I wasn’t sure I wanted to see it, because it brings you back to the day,” said Nacke, a Baltimore County police officer. His brother, Louis Nacke, was aboard United Flight 93, which crashed into a Pennsylvania field on September 11, 2001. “Do you really want to relive those emotions again? But in hindsight, I’m glad I did.”

Nacke, who described the movie as ‘powerful’, travelled with seven family members, including his wife, to the special screening in advance of the film’s public release later this month.

Saturday’s screening of United 93 for families of those who died illustrates anew the unusual roles that the tragedy has bestowed upon the families.

“The loss is not just individual but also civil,” said the Reverend Paul Britton, of Huntington Station, New York, whose sister, Marion Britton, was also aboard Flight 93 when it crashed as passengers tried to wrest control from the hijackers. “Culturally, we’re still trying to figure out how we’ve been shaped by that disaster.”

For the families, fresh reminders, and fresh retellings, arrive with each new turn — from Al Qaeda conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui’s death-penalty trial underway in Virginia to the upcoming theatrical release of United 93. The movie will premiere on April 25 at New York’s Tribeca Film Festival.

The persistence of September 11 in the national discourse has left many of the families struggling to balance private reflection and public dissection.

For Lisa Beamer, whose husband, Todd Beamer, issued the memorable directive “Let’s roll” to start the assault on the hijackers, the desire for normality for her two daughters has worn out. After initially stepping onto the national stage in the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attacks, Beamer has since avoided public attention and rarely discusses September 11 publicly.

But others, such as Hamilton Peterson, have devoted their unwanted celebrity to championing causes related to the terrorist attacks. Peterson has channelled grief over the loss of his father and stepmother, Donald and Jean Peterson, into the Families of Flight 93, working to erect a memorial at the crash site near Shanksville and lobbying for fuller disclosure of tapes and transcripts from September 11.

Peterson flew from his home in Bethesda on Saturday morning to attend the Newark screening, which he and Nacke estimated drew 80 or more people.

After watching the film, Peterson joined Nacke in lauding Universal Studios and director Paul Greengrass for what they felt was a realistic re-creation of events whose true details can only be guessed at.

“Universal did justice to history, based on what I know” from listening to the still-unreleased cockpit recordings, Peterson said. “You could hear a pin drop at times. When it was over, there was not a dry eye in the house.”

United 93 is built around an imagined re-creation of the last 90 minutes of the lives of some of the people aboard Flight 93. Passengers used cellphones to call families, 911 operators and co-workers, though clear details of the last few moments of the flight died with those aboard the plane. —Dawn/The Los Angeles Times News Service