Five Minutes of Heaven Review
Posted by Erik Luers on 08.26.2009
In a way, it works, and in a way, it doesn't.........
Liam Neeson ... Alistair Little
James Nesbitt ... Joe Griffen
Anamaria Marinca ... Vika
Juliet Crawford ... Cathy
Niamh Cusack ... Alistair's Mum
Mark David ... Young Alistair (as Mark Davison)
Gerry Doherty ... Joe's Dad
There’s a lot to like in Oliver Hirschbiegel’s Five Minutes of Heaven, a new film that seems very brief but direct and to the point. There are good performances, good writing, and some nice looking shots that give off the sense of a cold, emotionless, dire setting, which in this case is Northern Ireland. I hear it rains quite often in Ireland, and this film’s darkened skies certainly bring truth to that claim. And yet, the film feels a little too abrupt, a little too bare. Its story is so basic and uncomplicated that our lead character appears to be moving on instinct, not intelligence. The film moves toward a conclusion that seems false and unwarranted; somewhat based on a true story, the facts are either twisted, dramatically heightened, or both. When Five Minutes of Heaven comes to a close, you may feel as though you’ve had a very intricate story spelled out for you in the simplest of terms. That doesn’t make the film uncompelling, however, just a run of the mill dramatized revenge story without much revenge and too much dramatizing. In a sense, the film works because it lowers its standards much of the way through. I enjoyed what I saw but wished there was more to it, and it’s up to you to determine whether or not that is high praise.
The film focuses on the Northern Ireland conflict in the mid 1970s (briefly described with intertitles), where thousands upon thousands of Irish men and women slayed one another over disagreements our screenplay only hints at. We meet Alistair Little, a teenage boy who is thrust into violence with the hopes of being recognized and appreciated. He’s a Henry Hill on the rise. One night, he murders a young man by shooting him through a window (he is sitting alone in the living room watching television). The murdered man’s little brother watches this all take place (he stares into Alistair’s eyes and is put in a trance), and is subsequently blamed by his emotionally abusive mother for doing nothing to prevent the hit.
This little boy will be cursed with feelings of guilt for the rest of his life, or so we are lead to believe. The film then jumps ahead to the present day where Alistair, now a reformed, noble man preaching nonviolence to all that will listen (he served twelve years in prison for the murder he had committed) is set to meet Joe Griffen, the traumatized little brother who’s face he has remembered for far too long. An entire television program is being centered around their highly anticipated meeting, and that’s when our adult actors, James Nesbitt and Liam Neeson, are introduced into the proceedings. Will Joe snap and take revenge for his brother’s death? Will he find it in his heart to forgive this murderer? Alistair informs one of the program’s producers that Joe is not interested in forgiveness, but we are none too sure of that.
As we will find out, the big confrontation isn’t as big as we'd expect, and the middle portion of Five Minutes of Heaven sort of plays like a cheat, or even a pointless waste of time, depending on how invested you are in the story. Since I was enjoying the narrative, I went along with it, and for the most part, enjoyed this section. I must admit though, for a film that builds itself so heavily on a face to face showdown, the narrative takes some awkward twists and turns in order to get there; the middle section is all hype lacking a payoff.
The actors move these scenes along. Neeson is always restrained and pulled back, and there is a monologue he gives to a bunch of television cameras that shows just how well he can pull a viewer in with his thought provoking line delivery. He is calm and smooth. One gets the sense that, due to his now almost celebrity status, Alistiar doesn’t have to raise voice in order for people to listen. He simply shows up with his sunglasses on and the crowds flock to him. Let it be known that this is not something that he necessarily wants. In a cruel sense of irony, the public appears to be sympathize more with the reformed Alistair than the torn apart Joe. The man with the sinful past always has the more compelling story, Guy Hibbert’s screenplay may be implying. This, of course, drives Joe insane, and Nesbitt gives a very real, sometimes hysterically comedic performance as a man who has put his life on hold in order to put all his energy into the need for vengeance (Joe is occasionally portrayed as a push over, hyper and nervous of the man he has been set up to meet). Nesbitt gives his character a lot of tics — the quick bursts of anger/excitement, the chain smoking — and his performance keeps the story engaging in intriguing ways.
One tension building scene, which must be aptly credited to both Nesbitt and Hirschbiegel, involves Joe walking down the stairs to meet Alistair as a camera crew captures his every move. As the cameraman descends backwards, he trips, and the situation is turned inside out. In order to create reality within the shot, they must redo it. Damn producers and their insistence on moving camera shots! Oh well, that’s show biz, I guess. All of the scenes involving Joe waiting upstairs to meet Alistair in this epic mansion worked for me, and Nesbitt gets the audience on his side with his wild performance that’s pathetic and sad in all the right ways.
It’s a shame that Hirschbiegel has to get in the way of what works by overdirecting certain moments to the point of manipulative melodrama. Filled with more quick cuts to previous heartbeaking events and interior monologues than the director knows what to do with, Five Minutes of Heaven is too jumbled to leave much of an impression. How many times can we cut back to that tragic night where Alistair killed Joe’s brother? Must Joe’s bitter mother really be horribly portrayed in such demonic flashbacks? We saw the 1975 sequence once (and just a short time ago), so there is no reason to constantly be bashed over the head with it. Hirschbiegel’s editing does work that we, the audience, should, and have, been doing all along.
And the quick asides that Joe internally makes come at you so fast that they aren’t anything more than frantic one liners. Why doesn’t Hirschbiegel have faith in his more than capable actors? Better yet, why doesn’t he have faith in his audience? He’s preaching to a choir that already knows the music.
When the men finally do meet, the results are unsatisfying. A big, anticlimatic fight takes place that is so overchoreographed that we feel as if these are two different characters than the ones we’d previously been following. By the time the two fly out a window and crash to the concrete below (and manage not more than a scratch or two on them) the film has not only switched its tone, but its intention. It’s an action showdown that has been carelessly placed in the wrong film.
Perhaps you'll enjoy this movie. It seems confused much of the time, but there is stuff to appreciate. The idea of "what happens in the past will greatly affect us in the future" works, and the addition of a historical perspective reminded me of last year's film from director Stephen Daldry, The Reader. It's interesting to see how people are affected by worldly circumstances beyond their control. If Joe hadn't been there the night his brother was put to rest, would his life have turned out any differently? And if Alistair hadn't been influenced by the social tragedies occurring in his country, would he have turned to a life of crime? There's a scene late in the film where Joe, describing his grief to a bunch of respectful strangers, breaks down and cries. The moment is effective because Hirschbiegel spares Nesbitt the theatrics his film has been littered with up to this point. Five Minutes of Heaven tries hard but ultimately lacks confidence. What's worse, a film without purpose or a film unaware of its buddening potential?
The 411: Five Minutes of Heaven has an excellent lead performance by James Nesbitt at its center, and a strong co-starring performance by Liam Neeson. They are the film's strongest points. The writing is heavy but intimate, and although it never fully comes together, the story is an interesting one, one that sheds light on a time I'd like to learn more about in the near future. Hirschbiegel's last film was the much maligned The Invasion, a film you've hopefully forgotten about by now. Five Minutes of Heaven is much better than that one. My oh my, is it better. It's not great, and it often feels too confused to provide a clear narrative, but what we have is adequate for what it is: a late summer, intimate character drama just enjoying its five good minutes.
