What is a person's life worth? That is the opening question of the movie as a law professor Kenneth Feinberg poses the question to his law students. After the 9/11 attacks, Michael Keaton (as Feinberg) is a lawyer tasked as a Special Master by the President to decide what each one of the 9/11 victims or their next of kin should receive in terms of monetary compensation. The government has stepped in to help with the compensation because to allow individual lawsuits against the major airlines and the businesses within the twin towers would alter the entire domestic economy. The movie is a very well-acted drama of the business aspects of the aftermath of 9/11 put into human terms.

The movie focuses on several groups of characters: the very wealthy who think they are worth more than others, first responders represented by two firemen, and a gay couple whose relationship was not recognized by law at the time. Finally, a civil activist (Stanley Tucci) who lost his wife in the towers, and is fighting to make the compensation from the government "fair" and more personal than the callous, "formula" that Keaton has come up with.

As the movie progresses, we see that Keaton, through Tucci, discovers that every person has an individual story and circumstances that determine their worth. Questions arise during the movie such as, are all people worth the same as human beings or do we determine the worth of an individual by their place in society or the dependents they left behind? As we see in the opening scenes in the law classroom, generally a person is worth what they think they are worth. Yet even then, is our sense of worth overinflated or underinflated? The bottom line is we all have worth and we need to realistically discover what that worth is. What are you as an individual adding to society?

Compelling aspects of the film were the use of actual footage of the attacks on 9/11 and the aftermath, including pictures of those trying to locate their loved ones who were missing or more likely incinerated during the attacks on the towers. It made for a more realistic look and remembrance of just how horrific that day was in American history. Music, especially opera music, was prevalent in Keaton's character's life. As the chaos and turmoil are going on around him, he often has his earphones on and is listening to opera music, which seems to isolate him as to what is going on around him. However, as the stress mounts, he is not even able to enjoy the music, because he cannot get the victims out of his mind. It isn't until this point that he changes his attitude and decides to truly help the victims find their worth.

Worth is an incredibly human story that shows just how complicated the world can get when you ask one simple question; what is the value of a life?

I'm sure that everyone associated with this project felt a great pressure to do the subject matter justice and I genuinely feel they did that. Worth is a superbly constructed movie with excellent pacing which allows you the time to experience the weight of the situation and the emotions of the people involved without ever feeling too slow or getting bogged down. This is a genuine achievement, as it's essentially a film about people talking in rooms and those are notoriously difficult films to make. The editor and all those involved in the final cut certainly deserve a lot of credit for that.

The acting is as good as you would expect it to be. This is certainly Keaton's movie, as his character is the focal point that the story returns to on a regular basis, and he carries that with his usual brilliance, but it must be said that there isn't a single bad performance in this movie. Everyone is fantastic and I feel this is the kind of film where if one person had been bad, it would have taken you out of the whole thing ... I was in it from start to finish.

Whatever your political views, I think this is an interesting look into a world that will be foreign to most of us, but we all need to understand.

8/10.

This is a difficult job to negotiate a fair settlement for the victims of any tragedy, and most insurance and large corporations have formulas for paying out in the case of injuries and death. Everyone knows this from old motor vehicle recalls and class action lawsuits.

So when people start saying it's not about the money, well, it's about the money and they want more is all.

Maybe the adjuster listened to more people and tinkered with his formula in order to get more claimants to sign on, but the bottom line is that he just paid them more is all. This obvious oversight is completely missed in the film and we are all supposed to believe that everyone agreed on their settlements 'cause it was good for the economy to recover and move on. Sure. Believe that with a truckload of salt.

Everyone just wants a chance to spill their story and help persuade other into thinking that their loved one was someone special and deserved more than average. This film does nothing to convince me that thousands of people agreed to settle last minute out of the goodness of their hearts.

Why make a film if you are going to gloss over the catalyst of the entire negotiation ?????? 3 stars for drama, but nothing really compelling to recommend this.