What is the economic cost of a human life? Worth, the latest film by director Sara Colangelo, is the true story of a Washington D.C. attorney who must answer that question when he's tasked with creating the September 11^th Victim Compensation Fund.

Written by Max Borenstein (Godzilla vs. Kong) and starring Michael Keaton, Stanley Tucci, and Amy Ryan, Worth is a strong, dramatic film that depicts the arc of a character who faces no real antagonist, but rather a moral one, when he’s placed in charge of an impossible task.

Worth has been floating around for so long that when it was originally written, the story wasn’t historical, but rather ripped from the headlines. Borenstein received Kenneth R. Feinberg’s 2005 memoir "What Is Life Worth?: The Inside Story of the 9/11 Fund and Its Effort to Compensate the Victims of September 11^th" from producer Sean Sorensen, who had a shopping agreement soon after the book’s release.

“I read it, thought it was fascinating, but didn’t know about it. I had no idea how to make it into a film,” Borenstein admits. He flew to Washington, D.C., to meet with Feinberg to learn more about his memoir and find a way to build an arc around his story.

How to tell a story with no villains

There was still one aspect of the story that Borenstein had to address though: “How do you make an exciting story when there are no real villains?” he asks. “This isn’t a story about the attacks — the bad guys aren’t a part of the story.”

Borenstein was a young and less-experienced writer at the time he wrote the original screenplay for Worth, which was over a decade ago, and admits that he was still discovering his process as he went along. As his career continued its upward trajectory, his process is continually evolving.

How Borenstein found his inspiration was by sinking his teeth into the research and discovering what the story was or would be.

“There comes a moment when it clicks in and presents itself. Having the patience to do the research and trust the process is the first step,” Borenstein says. To put the film together meant figuring out how to distill the facts in a way that was both digestible and emotionally powerful — a challenge when most of the film revolves around characters talking in rooms. What started as that initial research meeting with Feinberg grew to include Camille Biros (played by Amy Ryan), Charles Wolf (played by Stanley Tucci), and others, including victims’ families who are also represented in the film. In addition to the interviews, Borenstein read the transcripts, reports that were filed, and books about 9/11 victims to absorb the full ecosystem of the stories.

When it comes to writing a historical-based film, he adds, “There’s no single way or trick to doing it.”

While it took well over a decade to get the film produced, there wasn’t much that changed from the draft Borenstein gave to Sorensen. The more he learned about the characters in real life, though, the richer he could make the details. As the talent came on board, Borenstein could take notes from actors like Keaton or Ryan and polish their character.

Borenstein’s other big challenge was making people talking in rooms interesting. No simple task, he admits.

“It would’ve made it a lot easier if there were bad guys,” Borenstein says. But there was a lot of antagonism that he could work with. Once he locked in on Feinberg’s arc of change — his emotional growth and empathy — and then include his relationship with Charles Wolf, it was clear that that was central to bringing out a lot of tension, using the conflict between those two characters to help drive the story and maintain interest.

“It’s a frustrating experience for Feinberg,” he says. “You have an immovable object and an unstoppable force — neither is in the wrong. You have two people with opposing agendas, but coming at it with the right kind of tension, as opposed to having one person right and the other wrong.”

Writing history

It’s important to point out that there must be a reason to tell a historical film now.

Borenstein says, “Define why you’re doing it beyond the fact that it happened — that’s a Wikipedia page, not a dramatic interest. What’s the reason to tell it now? If the reason you’re telling it is because it really happened, that’s not good enough.”

For every moment in the film, he believes that you must have an answer to why it’s important now, including why it’s your POV now. “You have to have a reason for it being beyond fact,” he insists.

Researching is more fun than writing because writing the script is hard. But it’s the writer’s obligation to decide the perspective and write from there. Borenstein suggests, “Start with what your point of view is, have an open mind, and have a strong enough POV [for] why you’re telling this story. At the end of the day, it’s a storytelling business — we’re not writing encyclopedia pages.”

Worth premieres on Netflix on September 3, 2021.