IMDB Ranking 6.2
The movie opens in 1973 Belfast with young Collette McVeigh lsing her younger brother, who she sent on an errand she was supposed to go on, to a shooting in the crossfire. The movie flashes forward to 1993 London where Collette leves a bomb in the transit system. Collette is quickly picked up by MI5 and questioned by Mac (Clive Owens). We found out that Collette left the bomb but did not set it go go off. Mac makes her an offer : years imprisonment in an English jail away from her young son or become an informer.
Collette decides she has to inform on the activity of her brothers who are active in the IRA. She tells Mac about a hit on a policeman that her brother had told her about. When the hit goes bad, Collette is a suspect and the plastic is laid out for her. She is able to talk her way out of it, but the IRA has red-lighted her.
There is a surprise twist at the end of the movie that just points out how crazy things really got. Eventually it was hard to tell what side you were really on.
The movie's main tones are suspense and tension. Will Collette's activities be discovered by the IRA? Will Mac be able to protect his informant? The movie, presented in an almost documentary style, has stripped away all the glory of the battle. There are no winners and no losers, just people caught in something they really don't want to be in. The IRA are divided and so are the MI5 members. Looking in from the outside you just want it all to stop, which I think is the main point of the movie. You realize that not everyone is going to be happy, no matter what, but it all just has to stop.
