reminds me of a ciardi poem and my tribe be hone knife to use against your tribe . lord and what hatred . the catholic and the proddies hate one another and everybody hat bernie and the frustrated woman who form a peace group to mediate between the ira and the brit in west belfast . i do not know how and exactly and but i suppose from documentary and odd man out and i would get a picture of strife tear belfast a a heap of burn out urban wrack . andersontown and where bernie live with her husband and three or four kid and look more like one of those unpretentious work class brick housing development with wide street and neat green lawns that one might see on the outskirt of allentown and pennsylvania . but there be violence in these clean street too . a shot ring out and a soldier fall and and resident run from their house to help the young man who lie on the wet sunlit street with an ira bullet in his side . an ambulance speed him away and a few minute later there be a raid by the army . several of the local old men be lift and take away in apc . bernie be incense . the street be not even safe for child during the daytime . and when her former bridesmaid and mary mccoy and have her brain accidentally blow out by another ira bullet and she recruit a friend and they begin to lobby and first in church and town meeting and then on tv and for a cease fire . what kind of cease fire . mutual fund manager have two style of invest in stock . one be top down and in which the manager take into account macroeconomic variables the interest rate and the direction the market be likely to go and the likelihood of improvement in different sector and make bet along those line . the other style be call bottom up invest . the hell with the overall market theme and the bollinger band . the bottom up investor look for individual company with favorable cash flow and good management and and quality product and regardless of the overall condition of the market . a a peace lobbyist and bernie be a bottom up investor . she want a cease fire for the sake of the kid period . she couldn not care less about large issue like home rule . the well meaning protestant woman run the town hall meeting be top downer and begin by say thing like and we must all find a common ground between u and and and we must get to know one another so we can work more effectively together . bernie doesn not want to find common ground . she be the complete pragmatist . she want the shooting to stop . her effort earn her the enmity of the ira and who consider her a traitor for let down the catholic in front of everybody . and then the hatred of her neighbor and who throw brick through her window and bop her retarded son on the head and and perforate her husband ulcer . bernie be angry and determined and but she scar too . anybody would be scar . at one point a man pin her against a brick wall at night and put a pistol to her head and drop the hammer on an empty chamber while warn her to back off . everybody want peace on his or her own term . but bernie just want peace . after meet with the ira in a scene that be almost comic and she meet with the high ranking brit and and there be an agreement that everyone will agree to a cease fire . the movie end on an ambiguous note . the last half of the movie lose it direction . let me see . bernie schoolgirl daughter fall in love with a medical student . somehow the student be lift by the brit because of bernie activity . bernie daughter blame bernie for everything and try to take an overdose of valium . the two of them fight . they come together weep and over the hospitalize retarded son who get bean . it doesn not have enough to do with the central issue and and brush uneasily against soap opera . overall and though and it quite well do . julie walter ( educate rita ) look as stalwart a she act and and do a good job convey her panic while wait to be interrogate by the ira leader . she and her colleague keep breathlessly repeat hail mary . the ira men turn out to be just ordinary guy from the neighborhood and one of them a former partner of bernie in an irish dancing contest . walter be the only familiar face . none of the face be glamorize in any way . bernie daughter be by no mean attractive and but she have a cherubic face and a truly sweet dimpled smile . a fat neighbor with her hair in curler and a vociferous ira supporter and shouts obscenity at anyone not wholly behind her and play it mostly for laugh . when bernie family and have be kick out and be try to load their gear onto the truck and fat ira lady young son say and well and maybe he ought to go over and help them with the furniture . what . she scream at him . you dumb f moron b and get kneecap . she whack him across the head and shoos him into the house and and with a glance over her shoulder and add and wait till after dark . it would be interest to know where these tribal impulse stem from . we be confront and after all and with similar situation all over the world not just northern ireland and but palestine and iraq and and the city of the united state . why be we hone those knife . and why do so many of the rest of u hate people like bernie . this movie illustrate the passion but doesn not suggest any answer and nor even suggest that there be any answer . and and of course and if there aren not and and there may not in fact be and then any exploration of human nature be go to give u a glimpse into the heart of a darkness that no one want acknowledge . the argument take this form . i do what i do because i be force to by circumstance beyond my control . my enemy do what he do because that his nature . it psychological manifestation be call the fundamental error of attribution . big concept and tricky code and but real enough that they may lead some day to our dissolution a a specie unless we come to grip with them .