The story of former UVF member Alistair Little. Twenty-five years after Little killed Joe Griffen's brother, the media arrange an auspicious meeting between the two.The story of former UVF member Alistair Little. Twenty-five years after Little killed Joe Griffen's brother, the media arrange an auspicious meeting between the two.The story of former UVF member Alistair Little. Twenty-five years after Little killed Joe Griffen's brother, the media arrange an auspicious meeting between the two.
- Won 1 BAFTA Award
- 10 wins & 12 nominations total
- Young Alistair Little - 1975
- (as Mark Davison)
- Director
- Writer
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
Featured reviews
Guy Hibbert wrote this excruciatingly visceral screenplay and Oliver Hirschbiegel directs a first rate cast. Though Liam Neeson is billed as the star, the film belongs to the powerful acting by James Nesbitt as the vengeful Joe Griffen. The cinematography is dark and dank like the atmosphere in both the warring fog of 1975 and the attempt at reconciliation in 2008. There are subtle pieces of thoughtful enhancement, such as the use of the Mozart 'Requiem' in the near hidden score. In all, this is a moving film about truth and reconciliation that deserves the attention of us all, especially in this time of random acts of terrorism and their possible imprint on our minds and on society.
Grady Harp
Because, as highlighted in this film, the question of forgiveness is not about erasing or escaping from the past but rather embracing it and find where the things left behind from the past, doesn't matter whether they were sweet or sour, fits to help bring out the most in life. The acting performances by both lead roles are commendable.
I have a confession--when the movie started I thought, okay, another pro-IRA movie with a heart. And it's not--it's a beautifully balanced movie about the personal horrors of the Northern Ireland bloodshed and the longterm aftermath as participants struggle to keep going.
The two main actors are both from Northern Ireland. Liam Neeson plays a Protestant who as a teenage killed a Catholic worker as part of the tit-for-tat violence of the time. James Nesbitt, a Roman Catholic, plays the brother of the man who was killed, and as a witness to the crime he holds a deep grudge about the murder. And in a key act of political insight, the actors were born on the opposite sides--Neeson was raised Catholic and Nesbitt raised Protestant.
The theme of the film is reconciliation in the mold of South African leader Nelson Mandela. The core of the movie is shot in a fancy Irish mansion where television crews are going to watch as the two men, mortal enemies decades before, make an effort to somehow move on, in public, on t.v.
How it goes is for you to see. The murder in the 1970s is fact, easy enough to believe, and the meeting of the men is fiction. Nesbitt is utterly terrific. You might think he's overacting (he is, of course, overacting) but it's appropriate, and gives this non-action film some intensity. Neeson is strong in his restraint and in the one main scene where he gives a well-written speech about how to understand these horrors he is also terrific.
The filming is extremely simple and in fact the whole scenario is relatively linear, even with all the flashbacks. There are some turns to the events by the last half hour, and in a way this is both the dramatic high and the disappointing low of the film (it resorts to somewhat corny and not quite smartly filmed sequences I won't elaborate). But overall the point is so strong and well meant it's hard to worry too much about whether it's a masterpiece.
It's not. It's sometimes slow, it says stuff we probably have absorbed pretty well by now, and it isn't very complex. But what it does do it does with compassion and conviction.
The two primary characters are very engaging; The emotion expressed and the reasons for it are carefully and sympathetically explained. There is a gentleness to the story amid the unforgiving violence. In no other historical or fictional portrayal have I heard so simply but properly explained why people got involved in violence in the six counties of Ireland.
I found it "cute" to hear Neeson speaking in his own accent for once.
Did you know
- TriviaLiam Neeson was raised a Catholic and portrays a Protestant. James Nesbitt was raised a Protestant and portrays a Catholic.
- GoofsLittle's photograph of Griffin's family changes between shots. In some scenes it has a border and in others it doesn't.
- Quotes
Alistair Little: [talking to TV camera] For me to talk about the man I have become, you need to know about the man I was. I was 14 when I joined the Tartan gangs and I was 15 when I joined the UVF. At that time, don't forget, there were riots on the streets every week; petrol bombs everyday, and that was just in our town. When you got home and switched on the TV, you could see what was happening in every other town as well, and it was like we were under siege. Fathers and brothers and friends were being killed in the streets, and the feeling was, we all have to do somethin'. We're all in this together and we all have to do somethin'.
Alistair Little: The thing you have to remember, what you have to understand, is the mindset. Once you have signed up to terror, and joined the organization - the group - your mind closes right down. It becomes only *our* story that matters, not their story - the Catholics. It's only *my* people that are being killed, and here suffering and that need looking after. Catholics being killed? Doesn't enter your head. And so when I went up to Sammy, our local commander, and told him I wanted to kill a Catholic man, it wasn't a wrong thing for me to do. In my head, it was the proper, the just, the fair, the good thing to do. And so, it was easy.
Alistair Little: When I got to the house, there was a boy in the street. I didn't expect him to be there, but, there he was. I only looked at him for a moment because I had a job to do, but if I had known that he was Jim's brother, I would have shot him as well. It was in the mindset. It was tit-for-tat, and perhaps one more - why not? That's what it was like. I was only 17. I'd seen my people fighting ever since I was a wee boy. You'd take sides with your friends as a boy, but we weren't just throwing stones over the fence, we were shooting guns. What I want to tell people - what society must do - is to stop people getting to the point where they join the group. Because when you get to that point it's too late. No-one's gonna stop you. No-one's gonna change your mind. And once you're in, you will do anything. You will kill anyone on the other side, because it's right to do it. Once your man has joined the group, society has lost him. And what he needs to hear are voices on his own side, stopping him before he goes in. There were no voices on my side, not on my side of the town, not in my state. No-one was telling me anything other than that killing is right. It was only in prison when I heard that other voice. And the Muslims now, you know the kids now are like I was then. They need to hear those voices now, stopping them from thinking that killing is good. They need *their own* people to say "no". That's where they need to hear it, and that's where I would put my money - on making those voices heard in every mosque in the country.
Alistair Little: When I got home, my mother and father were watching the TV, and it came on the news that the man I had shot was dead. I was so excited, I couldn't wait for when I would get my congratulations. Sammy was going to come knocking at my door, he was going to lead me out into the street and proudly walk me into the bar, and everybody was gonna stand up and applaud. Me? I would've shot anyone for that. And that is why I talk to anybody who would listen now, to tell them to stop boys like me thinking that to shoot an innocent, and a decent man in the head, is a good thing.
- ConnectionsFeatured in WatchMojo: Top 10 Liam Neeson Performances (2012)
- SoundtracksA Glass of Champagne
Written by Georg Kajanus
Performed by Sailor
Courtesy of Sony BMG Records
Under license by Sashay Music & Warner Chappell Music Publishing
Details
Box office
- Gross US & Canada
- $15,676
- Opening weekend US & Canada
- $5,364
- Aug 23, 2009
- Gross worldwide
- $364,355
- Runtime
- 1h 29m(89 min)
- Color
- Sound mix
- Aspect ratio
- 1.85 : 1