'71

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Movie
Original title '71
Country of production United Kingdom
original language English
Publishing year 2014
length 100 minutes
Age rating FSK 16
Rod
Director Yann Demange
script Gregory Burke
production Angus Lamont ,
Robin Gutch
music David Holmes
camera Anthony Radcliffe
cut Chris Wyatt
occupation

'71 (alternative long title: '71: Behind Enemy Lines ) is the debut feature film by the British director Yann Demange from 2014 . Set at the time of the Northern Ireland conflict in 1971, the film focuses on a young English soldier (played by Jack O'Connell ) who gets caught between the fronts in what was then a civil war in Belfast .

'71 premiered on February 7, 2014 as part of the competition at the 64th Berlin International Film Festival.

action

Belfast, 1971: young and politically inexperienced Gary Hook leaves his Derbyshire homeland to join his home-living younger brother to serve as a British Army recruit in Northern Ireland. The soldiers are supposed to secure the borders in the urban area between the "friendly" Protestants and the "hostile" Catholics. A few days after arriving in town, Gary and his unit are supposed to support a police house search in a Catholic neighborhood. The operation fails, however - while the police are brutally cracking down on alleged Catholic terrorists, an angry Catholic mob outside on the street is pushing the English soldiers back into their trucks. As the inexperienced platoon leader ordered that shields and helmets be left in the barracks, several soldiers were injured by stones. Gary and his friend, soldier Thommo, are separated from their squad when a boy steals Thommo's rifle. Gary and Thommo are beaten up by some men until a woman present stands in front of the British soldiers. In the crowd, Thommo is shot dead by radical young men from the IRA . Gary manages to escape injured and he hides in an outside toilet.

When night falls, Gary leaves his hiding place and tries to get back to his barracks. He steals items of clothing from the clothesline in order not to be recognized as an English soldier on the streets. While the two IRA members are looking for Gary, he makes the acquaintance of the young Protestant Billy, who incites against Catholics. He promises Gary that he will be returned to his barracks. While stopping at a Protestant pub, Gary becomes aware of a planned bomb attack on Catholics in which MRF member Sergeant Leslie Lewis is also involved. Lewis hands the protestant militiamen present a bomb to be planted in an IRA pub. The owner of the pub (Billy's uncle) takes his dog tag from Gary and hands it to Sergeant Lewis. Lewis orders two beers and orders Gary to stay in the pub until he gets back. Shortly after Lewis leaves the pub, the bomb unexpectedly explodes. Gary escapes injured, but only because he accidentally approached the exit earlier. Before dragging himself away, he rescues the boy Billy seriously injured from the flames. After a few meters on the road, Gary passes out. He is found by the Catholic Eamon and his daughter Brigid. The former paramedic takes care of Gary's wounds, but both are close to the IRA and are undecided about his future fate.

Gary escapes from Eamon and Brigid's apartment while the IRA and MRF search for the soldier. In the high-rise complex, Gary manages to stab an IRA member, but later he is overpowered by two other IRA members and is said to be shot by the young IRA member Sean in an empty café. He is wounded by Sergeant Lewis, who plans to suffocate Gary so that he cannot expose his participation in bomb attacks against Catholic pubs. At the same time, the commander of Gary's unit, Lt. Armitage to storm the cafe. The wounded Sean shoots Lewis who is trying to kill Gary. Sean in turn is shot by the approaching commander. Meanwhile, MRF Captain Sandy Browning lets an arrested young IRA member run in order to turn him against the senior management team with whom he is in contact.

The incident is swept under the table by the army leadership. You don't want to believe Gary that Sergeant Lewis wanted to kill him. It would be too tricky to have to admit that the MRF itself is involved in acts of terrorism. The surviving Gary returns to England. He throws his dog tag into the water while crossing the ship and drives into the sunrise with his little brother in the last shot.

History of origin

The film was made at the suggestion of the film producer Angus Lamont , who had become aware of the Scottish writer Gregory Burke . With Black Watch (2006), Burke had written a very successful play about the Iraq war and Lamont suggested a script project for a fictional film set before the Northern Ireland conflict. Lamont himself knew stories of soldiers who had been separated from their troops. Since there are tensions and disputes in Scotland itself, they would not have agreed on a Scottish but an English soldier as the main character. Burke described the script development together with Lamont and later with director Yann Demange as a long "labor-intensive process". Demange had moved with his parents from Paris to London at the age of two and first became aware of the Northern Ireland conflict through media reports in the background. Demange said he had originally not planned to make a feature film about Northern Ireland. The music video director would have looked for a feature film project for years before receiving the script from Gregory Burke. “A great story, I immediately found it relevant, exciting, meaningful and it was specifically Northern Ireland at first, but then I think it's a universal problem, the story of the soldier Gary Hook, who has to go to Northern Ireland, that's the focus of the story , the narratives. And I was still familiar with the context from before. "

Awards

'71 received a special mention from the Ecumenical Jury at the 2014 Berlinale . In the same year the film won the Golden Athena the main prize of the Athens International Film Festival and director Yann Demange was at the presentation of the European Film Awards in the category European Discovery of the Year nomination.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Release certificate for '71 . Voluntary self-regulation of the film industry , December 2014 (PDF; test number: 148 962 V).
  2. ↑ Berlinale press conference ( memento of March 4, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) at berlinale.de on February 7, 2014 (12:30 pm; accessed on February 15, 2014).
  3. ↑ Berlinale press conference ( memento of March 4, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) at berlinale.de on February 7, 2014 (9:30 a.m.; accessed on February 15, 2014).