Hennessy casts Rod Steiger as an IRA man who has renounced violence and then goes back to it when his wife and daughter are killed in one of the many outbreaks of street violence in Belfast. He's going to shake the foundations of the United Kingdom in one explosive blast and horrific thing is that he almost succeeds in doing it.
The incident where Steiger's wife and daughter are killed and it's one of those horrific accidents with kids throwing rocks and bottles at troops and them just being in the wrong place at the wrong time when a rock hits a British soldier and he's stunned and he fires his automatic weapon on reflex. Still there's no convincing Steiger he's not due for some payback.
But Steiger's got both the IRA and the British authorities looking for him. The IRA is afraid of bad international publicity if Steiger succeeds. This is the part of the film I'm not too keen on. Mind you this is the same IRA who in real life four years later didn't consider Lord Louis Mountbatten or his teen grandson off limits. Still with Steiger hunted by all it does make for some exciting cinema.
What Steiger has in mind is to rig a vest with gelignite and sneak into the opening of Parliament while Queen Elizabeth is giving her opening address and blow the place up. Leading Scotland Yard's effort against him is Richard Johnson who's been a victim of IRA terrorism himself and has a real hate for the crowd. They are an evenly matched pair of adversaries.
Now we all know that such a thing didn't happen, still the way news coverage of an opening is worked in with the story seamlessly makes for some very good cinema.
Trevor Howard is on hand as the chief inspector at Scotland Yard and Lee Remick plays an IRA widow who shelters Steiger in London without knowing his purpose. If you don't blink you'll catch Patrick Stewart in an early film role.
Hennessy is very exciting cinema and very relevant for the times we live in.
The incident where Steiger's wife and daughter are killed and it's one of those horrific accidents with kids throwing rocks and bottles at troops and them just being in the wrong place at the wrong time when a rock hits a British soldier and he's stunned and he fires his automatic weapon on reflex. Still there's no convincing Steiger he's not due for some payback.
But Steiger's got both the IRA and the British authorities looking for him. The IRA is afraid of bad international publicity if Steiger succeeds. This is the part of the film I'm not too keen on. Mind you this is the same IRA who in real life four years later didn't consider Lord Louis Mountbatten or his teen grandson off limits. Still with Steiger hunted by all it does make for some exciting cinema.
What Steiger has in mind is to rig a vest with gelignite and sneak into the opening of Parliament while Queen Elizabeth is giving her opening address and blow the place up. Leading Scotland Yard's effort against him is Richard Johnson who's been a victim of IRA terrorism himself and has a real hate for the crowd. They are an evenly matched pair of adversaries.
Now we all know that such a thing didn't happen, still the way news coverage of an opening is worked in with the story seamlessly makes for some very good cinema.
Trevor Howard is on hand as the chief inspector at Scotland Yard and Lee Remick plays an IRA widow who shelters Steiger in London without knowing his purpose. If you don't blink you'll catch Patrick Stewart in an early film role.
Hennessy is very exciting cinema and very relevant for the times we live in.