In February, 1975, in Northern Ireland, seventeen year-old UVF member Alistair Little kills the catholic Jimmy Griffin in his house in Lurgan in front of his younger brother Joe Griffin. Alistair is arrested and imprisoned for twelve years while Joe is blamed by his mother for not saving his brother. Thirty-three years later, a TV promotes the meeting of Alistair and Joe in a house in River Finn, expecting the truth and the reconciliation of the murderer and the victim who actually seeks five minutes of heaven.

Five Minutes of Heaven (2009)
  • Rating: (6,392 votes)
  • Tagline:To face the future, they must face the past. »
  • Runtime:89 minutes
  • Director: Oliver Hirschbiegel
  • Countries:UK, Ireland
  • Actors:
    Young Alistair (as Mark Davison)
    Mark Ryder
    Andy
    Diarmuid Noyes
    Alistair's Mum
    Niamh Cusack
    Stuart
    Mathew McElhinney
    Dave
    Conor MacNeill
    Alistair's Dad
    Paul Garrett
    Young Joe
    Kevin O'Neill
    Jim
    Gerard Jordan
    Joe's Mum
    Paula McFetridge
    Joe's Dad
    Gerry Doherty
  • Genres:Crime, Drama, Thriller
  • Producers:
    Ed Guiney
    executive producer  
    François Ivernel
    executive producer (as Francois Ivernel) 
    Marshall Leviten
    line producer (as Marshall Levitan) 
    Andrew Lowe
    executive producer  
    Cameron McCracken
    executive producer  
    Don Mullan
    associate producer  
    Eoin O'Callaghan
    producer  
    Patrick Spence
    executive producer  
    Paul Trijbits
    executive producer  
    Stephen Wright
    producer  
  • Plot: In February, 1975, in Northern Ireland, seventeen year-old UVF member Alistair Little kills the catholic Jimmy Griffin in his house in Lurgan in front of his younger brother Joe Griffin. Alistair is arrested and imprisoned for twelve years while Joe is blamed by his mother for not saving his brother. Thirty-three years later, a TV promotes the meeting of Alistair and Joe in a house in River Finn, expecting the truth and the reconciliation of the murderer and the victim who actually seeks five minutes of heaven. Written by Claudio Carvalho, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil
Five Minutes of Heaven
  • User's comment:A very good film, I enjoyed it and it tells a story that needs to be told by Fergal O'Shea

    Its probably pertinent I mention that I'd watch Liam Neeson reading the phone book - and walk away content. Having said that this is a story that needs to be told. People delude themselves if they think the formal end of a conflict ends the collateral damage thats a product of conflict.

    The two primary characters are very engaging; The emotion expressed and the reasons for it are carefully and sympathetically explained. There is a gentleness to the story amid the unforgiving violence. In no other historical or fictional portrayal have I heard so simply but properly explained why people got involved in violence in the six counties of Ireland.

    I found it "cute" to hear Neeson speaking in his own accent for once.


  • Quote: Alistair Little: For me to talk about the man I have become, you need to know about the man I was. I was fourteen when I joined the tartan gangs and I was fifteen when I joined the UVF. At that time, don't forget, there were riots on the streets every week; petrol bombs everyday, and that was just in our town. When you got home and switched on the TV, you could see what was happening in every other town as well, and it was like we were under siege. Fathers and brothers and friends were being killed in the streets, and the feeling was we had to do something. We're all in this together and we all have to do something. The thing you have to remember; what you have to understand, is the mindset. Once you have signed up to terror, and joined the organization; the group, your mind closes right down. It becomes only our story that matters, not their story - the Catholics. It's only *my* people that are being killed, and here suffering and that need looking after. Catholics being killed? Doesn't enter your head. And so when I went up to Sammy, our local commander, and told him I wanted to kill a Catholic man, it wasn't a wrong thing for me to do. In my head, it was the proper; the just; the fair; the good thing to do, and so, it was easy. When I got to the house, there was a boy in the street. I didn't expect him to be there, but, there he was. I only looked at him for a moment because I had a job to do, but if I had known that he was Jim's brother, I would have shot him as well. It was in the mindset. It was tit-for-tat, and perhaps one more - why not? That's what it was like. I was only seventeen. I'd seen my people fighting ever since I was a wee boy. You'd take sides with your friends as a boy, but we weren't just throwing stones over the fence - we were shooting guns. What I want to tell people; what society must do is to stop people getting to the point where they join the group. Because when you get to that point it's too late. No-one's gonna stop you. No-one's gonna change your mind. And once you're in, you will do anything. You will kill anyone on the other side, because it's right to do it. Once your man has joined the group, society has lost him. And what he needs to hear are voices on his own side, stopping him before he goes in. There were no voices on my side, not on my side of the town, not in my state. No-one was telling me anything other than that killing is right. It was only in prison when I heard that other voice. And the Muslims now - you know the kids now are like I was then. They need to hear those voices now, stopping them from thinking that killing is good. They need *their own* people to say "no". That's where they need to hear it, and that's where I would put my money - on making those voices heard in every mosque in the country. When I got home, my mother and father were watching the TV, and it came on the news that the man I had shot was dead. I was so excited, I couldn't wait for when I would get my congratulations. Sammy was going to come knocking at my door, he was going to lead me out into the street and proudly walk me into the bar, and everybody was gonna stand up and applaud. Me? I would've shot anyone for that. And that is why I talk to anybody who would listen now, to tell them to stop boys like me thinking that to shoot an innocent, and a decent man in the head, is a good thing.
  • Also known as: Cinco minutos de gloria (Argentina - imdb display title), Cinco minutos de gloria (Spain - imdb display title), Öt perc mennyország (Hungary - imdb display title), 5 lepta prin ton Paradeiso (Greece - transliterated ISO-LATIN-1 title), A l'ombre de la vengeance (Canada - imdb display title, French title), Cennette bes dakika (Turkey - festival title, Turkish title), Cinco Minutos de Paz (Portugal - imdb display title), Requiem (Japan - DVD title, English title),

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