Five minutes of heaven

“For me to talk about the man I have become, you need to know about the man I was,” says Alistair Little in the very opening of Oliver Hirschbiegel’s Five Minutes of Heaven (2009). Indeed, the past is never dead and the volatile future is but a reflection of what happened in the past.

In 1975, eleven-year-old Joe Griffin witnessed the killing of his brother by seventeen-year-old Ulster Volunteer Force member Alistair Little. Thirty-three years later, Joe and Alistair are made to meet on live TV, but their meeting is far from reconciliatory – while the killer dares not seek forgiveness, the victim’s brother is loath to grant it.

True that Joe deserves his five minutes of heaven by avenging the murder of his brother, but Alistair, who’s already served twelve years in prison, is still haunted by the enormity of what he did as a young fanatic. And interestingly enough, it’s Alistair who helps the brooding man awaken to reality: “Don’t give [your daughters] me. Go home and tell them you’ve killed me off, that I’m gone, forever.” The film ends with Joe crying and talking about his daughters to the members of a psychological support group, while Alistair, alone all along, is seen standing in the middle of a busy Belfast intersection and then mingling with the crowd.

The major films dealing with the ethno-political conflict of Northern Ireland have given a largely nationalist perspective on it. But one of the virtues of Hirschbiegel’s dramatisation of what might have happened if Joe and Alistair ever met is that it gives an account of “the Troubles” from both sides of the chasm. Not only does the film implicitly question the morality of Joe’s desire for revenge, it also foregrounds Alistair’s struggle for redemption.

As Joe Griffin, Northern Irish actor James Nesbitt gives a tour de force performance. One can’t

miss the devastating realism of the scenes featuring his interior monologues. Veteran actor Liam Neeson also does a great job as Joe’s arch-enemy, Alistair. However, there are scenes that betray the Irish heavyweight is the most expensive (and therefore, the most important) actor in the film. For example, when Alistair-Neeson, flanked by the TV crew, enquires after Joe, the audience can’t but perceive the implied class difference: the other characters are overshadowed not only by Neeson’s persona but also by what he has to say.

Five Minutes of Heaven stands out as the most balanced work in Hirschbiegel’s oeuvre. In his debut project Das Experiment (2001), the German director dealt with a social experiment gone wrong. His Der Untergang (2004) famously chronicled the last few days of Hitler as the all-powerful Führer. In Five Minutes of Heaven, he gives a new dimension to a well-known historical incident, thereby not only making the film a riveting thriller centring on a “what if” situation but also an enduring human drama about loss, grief and the necessity of forgiveness.

Two thumbs up!