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Today, 13 October 2008

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"Sunday, Bloody Sunday..."

One Sunday in 1972, British soldiers opened fire on protesters at a Northern Ireland civil rights march in the town of Derry, shooting 27 unarmed civilians, of whom 14 died.

This is the story of that day.

Shot documentary-style, covering just 24 hours, with a jerky, hand-held camera feel and bleached of most colour, this film provides a searing glimpse into the events of the Londonderry massacre, or as it came to be known, Bloody Sunday.

Derry is a town so riven by conflict that even its name is in doubt. Protestants call it Londonderry, but Catholics refer to it simply as Derry. Nevertheless, the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association — a non-violent movement — was born here in 1968.

Four years later, following Bloody Sunday, the civil rights movement was dead. No longer was there a non-violent alternative for Catholics unhappy with British governance. There was only the IRA.

More than thirty years later, the wounds of Bloody Sunday are not yet healed, and the events of that day still drive politics in Northern Ireland. It’s not entirely clear what happened, as the army maintain they were fired on first. On the other hand, no evidence was found to support their claims.

The images will stay with you. British soldiers pumping bullets into the fleeing crowd. Bodies heaped in a pile on the hospital floor. A Civil Rights banner draped in blood, covering the corpse of an unarmed protester. Young men queuing for IRA guns.

I was particularly impressed by actor James Nesbitt, in his role as local politician Ivan Cooper, a moderate Protestant and Civil Rights stalwart.

Filmmaker Paul Greengrass’ meticulously researched remembrance of Bloody Sunday is both moving and shocking, and deserves to be seen.

For more information, take a look at the film's official website: http://www.paramountclassics.com/bloodysunday/

What the international critics are saying:

"Both an admirable reconstruction of terrible events, and a fitting memorial to the dead of that day, and of the thousands thereafter."
— John Patterson, L.A. WEEKLY

"Bloody Sunday not only is a classic study in the way things can go devastatingly, violently wrong, but also a lesson in the importance of not letting that happen."
— Steven Rosen, DENVER POST

"Unfolds with such a wallop of you-are-there immediacy that when the bullets start to fly, your first instinct is to duck."
— Bruce Newman, SAN JOSE MERCURY NEWS