Great Cast and writing makes for a wonderful true film about injustice!

Rating: 10/10 (2 January 2006)

It is no surprise that Peter Postlewaite O.B.E. was rated as one of Steven Spielberg's favorite actors. He gives an understated and well deserved academy award nomination for his performance as the father of Daniel Day-Lewis's character. You learn to easily accept them as father and son in this film. They work very well together. Emma Thompson also get a supporting role as the British lawyer who helps Gerry get out of prison and exonerated for the crimes. The film pulls no punches about the violent persuasion into making a false confession. It breaks your heart to see lies, propaganda, and innocent people going to prison for crimes they didn't commit in the first place but it does happen all the time which is why I am against capital punishment in my country for that reason. The film earned several academy award nominations including for best actor in which Daniel Day Lewis also became a naturalized Irish citizen. He would seem an unlikely candidate for British knighthood like his grandfather now. The film is more relevant today than when it was released. Terrorism has returned with a vengeance. People seem willing to put innocent people behind bars because of their ethnicity. We must learn a valuable lesson in not judging a book by its cover. In the meantime, prison life was not enjoyable but neither torturous. Both Gerry and Giuseppe Conlon are in prison together which makes the situation bearable. In fact the other prisoners are more decent and hospitable than the men who put the innocent men there in the first place. Gerry does honor his father's memory by clearing his injustice.