A Monkey Movie Review

I can sum up this film in one word: Wow.

This gripping gritty raw film is a fictional account of the damage done when a Protestant loyalist who is in the Ulster Volunteer Force (a pro British paramilitary group in Northern Ireland) murders a Roman Catholic man in cold blood. Liam Neeson, in a stunningly great performance, plays the shooter and James Nesbitt, who turns in the performance of a lifetime, plays the younger brother of the murdered man who witnessed the crime.

The two men are consumed with guilt, rage, despair, and bitterness over the next 30 years after the slaying took place. Neeson's character reaches out to others to try to get them to stop them from going down the road he went down. Nesbitt's character is consumed with bitterness over the murder of this brother, over the blame his mother placed on him for the his older brother's death, and over how Neeson's character is getting lionized in the press for reaching out to try to stop the violence. The two men agree to meet one another and allow their meeting to be filmed for a television show about reconciliation, but things take a sideways turn when Nesbitt backs out at the last second.

Ultimately the two men come to a place where they can finally leave the past behind.

This film was hard to watch at times and when it wasn't hard to watch, it was gut wrenching. Neeson plays the guilt ridden shooter with a heavy dose of world weariness. He seems so self possessed at the start of the film but by the end you see the toll the murder took on him. And as good as Neeson is, Nesbitt is even better. His twitchy nervous bitter impotent rage is something to behold. I got chills watching him in this role. He's a big time movie actor, which is different from being a big time movie star. Bruce Willis is a good movie star, James Nesbitt is a great movie actor. This is Nesbitt's second great turn in a film about 'the troubles' in Northern Ireland. He was also very very good in Bloody Sunday. It's a shame that his talent is not more appreciated in this country.

I really felt for Nesbitt's character in this film and I was left wondering how I would react if I was given the chance to meet face to face with the man who was driving the car that killed my sister Linda or the doctor who killed my mother on the operating table. I'd probably react a lot like Nesbitt did in this film.

I can't recommend this one highly enough but be warned, it's not a happy little film and it may change you in ways you never thought about.