Bloody Sunday
With breathtaking verisimilitude,Bloody Sundayposits an  immediate, you-are-there re-creation of Ireland's most controversial  contemporary tragedy. From dusk to dawn, the events of January 30, 1972, are  presented in convincingveritéfashion; by employing rapid fade-to-black  transitions, director Paul Greengrass approaches two perspectives with equal  anticipation of potential disaster, based on facts as reported in Don Mullan's  politically influential bookEyewitness Bloody Sunday. Ivan  Cooper (James Nesbitt) is, ironically, a Protestant Member of Parliament,  leading a peaceful but tensely expectant civil rights march through the Catholic  "bogside" of the city of Derry, in protest of the British practice of internment  without trial. He watches in horror as his throng of unarmed protesters  splinters against British paramilitaries who impulsively open fire. No question  where Greengrass's sympathies lie (heard but not seen, the first shots are  British), but despite charges of inaccuracy and bias,Bloody Sundaywill  likely stand as the definitive cinematic representation of that horrible day  when deadly confusion reigned supreme. (U2's "Sunday Bloody Sunday" plays over  the closing credits; any other choice would have been blasphemous.)--Jeff  Shannon