The rough diamonds of the Parachute Regiment are persuasively deemed, in Paul Greengrass's gut-wrenchingly powerful newsreel-vérité work, to have disgraced themselves utterly in the grotesque fiasco of Bloody Sunday. Thirteen unarmed civilians were shot dead during a Northern Ireland civil rights march in the Bogside, 30 years ago this week. The Westminster political establishment were pretty calm about this sort of far-off disorder - until 1990, when the Trafalgar Square poll tax riot put the fear of God into them.
Forget about the controversy: this is visceral, rocket-fuelled film-making. It has a cracking performance from James Nesbitt as the harassed idealist leading a would-be peaceful march, his smiley face turning into a mask of horror. On the one side are the Paras, determined to show the locals who's boss; on the other, the chilling cynics of the IRA, delighted at the recruiting possibilities.
Is this film fair? Without first-hand knowledge, it's impossible to say. The Paras are convincingly shown indulging in insane overreaction, though among the officers, Chris Villiers as Major Steele looked the most like a genuine non-thespian professional soldier. But as it happens, the film does actually show one hooligan, detached from the march, firing a pistol into the air from a doorway.
Meanwhile that same year, off-screen, Olympic officials are preparing for the Munich games, and in 2002 the Middle East and Northern Ireland "peace processes" are still staggering bloodily on. If you haven't caught it on TV, or even if you have, Greengrass's film demands to be seen.
