Anemone (2025)
Director: Ronan Day-Lewis
Writers: Ronan Day-Lewis, Daniel Day-Lewis
Stars: Daniel Day-Lewis, Sean Bean, Samantha Morton
Release dates: September 28, 2025 (NYFF); October 3, 2025 (United States); November 7, 2025 (United Kingdom)
Plot: In Northern England, a man heads out on a journey into the woods to reconnect with the estranged hermit brother with whom he shared a complicated past that was altered by life-changing events decades ago.
* * *
Anemone (2025) | Transcript
(pencil scratching on paper) (pencil continues scratching, then stops abruptly)
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
(music stops abruptly)
(wind howling)
(wind whistling)
(thumping)
(grunting)
JEM: Father in heaven, I kneel before you today… …in your omnipotent presence… …to ask that you grant me strength.
The strength to power through all the tasks today, whether little or big.
I know it is by your will that I live, O Lord.
And I know it is also by your will that I will not go weak today.
I will not go lazy… nor will I fail to do the things that are set before me.
(shower water running)
(water stops)
Thank you for your everlasting presence, Lord, and in Jesus’ name I pray.
(whispering): In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
♪ ♪
JEM: Um, I’m gonna be going away for a few days.
I won’t be that long, but your-your mother’s here, and-and she… um…
(sighs) You know.
Anyway, I just thought to let you know I’m going away and, uh…
♪ ♪
(Jem sighs)
(footsteps receding)
(door closes)
♪ ♪
(Jem sighs)
♪ ♪
(no dialogue)
(Jem inhales sharply, exhales)
(engine starts, idling)
(engine revving)
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
(engine revving)
♪ ♪
(engine stops)
(panting softly)
(water trickling)
REPORTER (over radio): Viking, North and South Utsire, Forties.
Southwesterly, veering northwesterly, six to gale eight, perhaps severe gale nine later.
Rain, then wintry showers, moderate or poor, becoming good.
Cromarty, Forth, Tyne, Dogger.
Southwesterly, veering westerly, five to seven, occasionally gale eight.
Rain, then showers, moderate or good.
Fisher, southwesterly, veering westerly, six to gale eight, perhaps severe gale nine later.
(tying shoe) Rain, then wintry showers, moderate or poor, becoming good.
German Bight, Humber.
Southwesterly, veering westerly, seven to severe gale nine, decreasing six in Humber later.
Rain, then showers, moderate or poor, becoming good.
Thames, Dover, Wight, Portland, Plymouth.
Southwesterly, six to gale eight, occasionally severe gale nine, veering…
(insects trilling)
(bird calling in distance)
(wind gusting)
(wind howling)
(wind whistling) (leaves rustling)
(engine starts)
(wind continues howling)
(“Solitude” by Black Sabbath playing in distance)
(panting)
(takes deep breath)
(“Solitude” continues)
♪ Is less ♪
♪ My future is shrouded ♪
♪ In dark wilderness ♪
♪ Sunshine is far away ♪
(faint, distant clattering)
♪ Clouds linger on ♪
(sets down glasses)
♪ Everything I possessed ♪
(music volume lowers)
♪ Now they are gone ♪
♪ They are gone ♪
♪ They are gone ♪
(takes deep breath)
♪ Oh, where can I go to? ♪
♪ And what can I do? ♪
♪ Nothing can please me ♪
♪ Only thoughts are of you ♪
(clicking)
(clicking)
♪ You just laughed ♪
♪ When I begged you to stay ♪
♪ I’ve not stopped crying ♪
♪ Since you went away ♪
(wind howling)
♪ You went away ♪
♪ You went away ♪
(water pouring)
(sets down kettle)
(picks up mugs)
(sets mugs on table)
♪ The world is a lonely place ♪
♪ You’re on your own ♪
♪ Guess I will go home ♪
♪ Sit down and moan ♪
♪ Crying and thinking ♪
♪ Is all that I do ♪
♪ Memories I have ♪
♪ Remind me of you ♪
♪ Of you ♪
♪ Of you ♪
(spoon clinking in mug)
(clinking stops)
(sets spoon on table)
♪ ♪
(exhales)
♪ The world is a lonely place ♪
♪ You’re on your own ♪
(Velcro ripping, rummaging)
♪ Guess I will go home ♪
♪ Sit down and moan ♪
♪ Crying and thinking ♪
♪ Is all that I do ♪
♪ Memories I have ♪
♪ Remind me of you ♪
♪ Of you ♪
(clicking)
♪ Of you. ♪
Our inheritance.
(rain pattering)
(burbling) (fire rumbling softly)
(rain pattering)
(sighs)
(clears throat softly)
(sighs)
(sighs)
(sighs)
(sniffs)
Thank you.
Bless us, O Lord, and these thy gifts… which we are about to receive.
Through Christ our Lord, we pray.
(“On the Beach” by Neil Young playing)
♪ All my pictures are fallin’ ♪
♪ From the wall
where I placed them yesterday ♪
(Jem humming softly)
♪ The world is turnin’ ♪
♪ Get outta town ♪
♪ Think I’ll get outta town ♪
♪ Get outta town ♪
♪ Think I’ll get outta town ♪
♪ I head for the sticks ♪
♪ With my bus and friends ♪
(blankets rustling)
♪ I follow the road ♪
♪ Though I don’t know
where it ends ♪
♪ Get outta town ♪
(Jem clears throat)
♪ Get outta town ♪
(Jem groans softly)
♪ Think I’ll get outta town… ♪
20 years, huh?
Bless you, brother.
Fuck off.
(song stops)
(quiet, heavy breathing)
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
(music stops abruptly)
(crying softly)
(sniffling)
(sighs)
(sobbing softly)
(whimpers)
NESSA: Brian.
(sniffling)
Brian.
(continues crying)
(sniffling)
(kisses)
Oh, sweetie.
(crying continues)
BRIAN: Where is he gone?
NESSA: Who?
Your dad?
BRIAN: Has he gone to see him?
But what the fuck has he got to do with it, Mum?
What has he got to do with it?
Everything.
BRIAN: What?
(breathing heavily)
Why’d you hurt that lad, eh?
He was fucking asking for it, Mum.
Brian.
(sniffles) Did he say something about your dad?
Jem is my dad.
Or he said something about Ray?
Well, if you know so much, then why are you asking me?
Don’t be so cheeky.
I’m just trying to talk to you.
You nearly murdered that lad.
Do you hear me?
One more killer in the family.
Who’s counting?
Ray’s not a killer.
And even if he was one, does it mean you have to be?
Eh?
Come here.
Ray’s not a killer.
♪ ♪
(whispering):
Our Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name.
Thy kingdom come, thy will be done as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.
♪ ♪
NESSA: Dear Ray, I’m not sure you’ll even get this letter or read it, even. So in the fact of hope and answered prayers you’ll be reading this one, I want to start by asking how you are. The silence still burns after all the years. And I often wonder if you think about me. Us.
(gasps softly)
(bed creaking)
JEM: Did you read it?
Did you read it?
No, I didn’t fucking read it.
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
Whoo!
(fire crackling)
(opens drawer)
(clears throat softly)
(closes drawer)
(sets glasses on table)
“Give strong drink unto him that is ready to perish, and wine unto the bitter in soul.”
JEM: Amen.
(Ray sighs)
(Jem coughs, clears throat)
(screws cap on bottle)
Her Majesty the Queen.
(grunts)
(Jem inhales sharply)
What happened to “for what we are about to receive”?
So it’s only before eating that you say grace?
He don’t mind if you have a few fucking bevvies without a word?
(exhales softly)
You forgot to wipe your arse this morning.
I saw the shit in your pants.
No, that were from yesterday.
You dirty bastard.
Is cleanliness next to godliness, would you say?
How do you know he’s not filthy?
Is there any evidence in the Bible that says God takes a bath three times a week?
Changes his undies every day?
God doesn’t need undies, ’cause he’s not full of shit like you are.
Oh, is that so?
Has he got an endless supply up there?
Bet he never has to wear the same pair twice.
Does he like a nice, snug fit?
Or does he like plenty of room for his big fucking God balls to swing around in?
You know, like massive fucking church bells, them.
Bet it’s like Canterbury Cathedral down below decks.
You’re going to hell, brother.
Family reunion?
Father Rippon died last week.
Saw it in the paper.
Don’t read papers.
Did you ever see him again?
Is that a question?
Did hear he were carted off to the nuthouse a few years ago.
Please read that letter, Ray.
When I were back on leave after third tour of the province-lost two of our lads on that one… started to think about him, Rippon.
More I thought about him, the more I wanted to pay him a visit, have a catchup.
A debrief about the good old days.
Anyway, when I got home, I looked him up.
Weren’t easy to find.
Course, they’d moved him around a bit.
Business as usual.
Tracked him down in Huddersfield.
Hmm.
Should’ve seen me all togged out in my number twos.
I mean, for someone that were in shit order most days of the week, I smartened up well.
Cacks under the mattress the night before.
Razor-sharp creases front and back.
I were bulling my boots all morning.
Like mirrors they were.
This were parade ground standard, Jem.
Could’ve done a ceremonial duty at Buck Pal, I looked that good.
Number two dress and medals.
I were that well turned out, I could hear our dear mother’s voice saying, “Come home, son.
All is forgiven.”
Number ones.
The what?
Number one dress at the palace.
Yeah, right, right.
That’s what I’m saying.
I were that smart, you wouldn’t have known the difference.
I suppose not if you were pig-ignorant.
(clears throat softly)
Hmm.
So, go round his house.
Lovely little grace-and-favor cottage paid for by His Holiness, no doubt.
Window boxes, perfect little lawn, hedges trimmed.
Knock on the door, and there he is.
All scrubbed up, pink and shiny.
He seemed so old.
I remember him as a big, strong bugger.
And there he were, scrawny little old man with a potbelly.
I was surprised at how small he looked.
I said, “Father Rippon, isn’t it?
“I’m collecting for the Veterans Association.
Would you mind if I stepped inside for a moment?”
I could tell he were impressed.
“Oh, do come in.
Do come in, young man.
You’re very welcome, son.
Do come in.”
He’s all fluffed up, bustling about.
The kettle’s on.
Fine china, biscuits, the whole works.
“You’ll take a cuppa, won’t you, son?”
So we sit down.
We sit down in his tidy little parlor, chatting about this and that.
I say, “This is your parish, is it, Father?”
He says, “Oh, I’m currently between parishes.
Semiretired, you know.”
I said, “Oh, that must be difficult after all the years of service.”
We talk about… talking about the state of things, the ungovernable, godless youth.
He asks me, “Are you of the faith, son?”
And I say, “Faith runs very deep in our family, Father.”
He says, “Of course, what I miss most of all is working with young people.”
I nearly choked on my custard cream.
Anyway, so, there’s a lull in the conversation, and he says, “Oh, I do beg your pardon, Corporal.
Perhaps you’d like something stronger.”
I just look at him for a long time.
“Would you like something stronger, Father?”
I could see the thrill of it coursing through him.
He didn’t dare believe.
His face darkened, his eyes all glittery.
He said, “Well, I would if you would.”
He starts to get up.
I say, “I’m very strong, Father Rippon.”
He sits back down as if his legs went from under him.
I say…
“Would you like to have a look?”
I start to unbutton my trousers.
I thought he might have a heart attack.
He just couldn’t believe it.
It was like Christmas come early.
So I stood myself up… teasing open the buttons like a rent boy.
Dropped the cacks, dropped my undies.
I say, “There it is.”
I said, “Lie down on the floor.”
He lies down, eager to accommodate.
I said, “In a crucifix.
That would make me nice and hard.”
Waddled forward a few steps.
I’m stood right over him.
Oh, there’s one detail I forgot to mention, Jem.
For a few days before I went round, I were on a diet of Guinness and curry.
And then the afternoon of, I took a handful of laxatives.
It were hard to get the timing right.
I was sat in my car outside his house for a couple of hours, and nothing was shifting.
As soon as I felt that stirring within, I knocked on his door.
As I’m sitting there, it’s welling up inside me, and now I swear I’m coming apart at the seams.
The rivets are popping out of me.
The army teaches you to grin and bear it, doesn’t it, Jem?
We do love the exquisite agony of self-denial.
So…
I’m stood over him.
(clicks tongue)
I say, “Don’t recognize me, do you?”
“What?”
I say, “Little Ray.
I’m your Little Ray from the care home.”
Takes him a good few moments, his eyes flicking this way and that.
When the penny drops, fear runs through him like electricity.
And the stinking sweat poured out of him.
“Oh, please don’t hurt me.
Please don’t hurt me.”
I said, “Don’t move.
“If you move an inch, I’ll cut off “your meat and potatoes “and shove them down your fucking throat.
You can suck yourself off for a change.”
Well, come to think of it, shame he didn’t learn to do that a few years ago.
He might have been self-sufficient.
Shuffled forwards, about-turn, very awkward, heels on his stringy little arms.
He flinched. I could tell it hurt him, but he daren’t move.
“Now, look up the sluice pipe, Father.”
And I squatted down.
And I manured him.
(laughing)
(laughing):
Now…
This evacuation were in three distinct phases.
First, I sprayed…
(laughing):
sprayed him.
Pebble-dashed him.
Like a flock of pigeons taking off, they were.
Then a couple of waves of hot lava.
And finally, one… one big…
(continues laughing)
…one big patty cake, like wet cement, flops out of me.
And he’s retching and spitting, and he daren’t breathe in, but he has to breathe.
And I’m laughing that much, I feared I might topple over into my own filth.
And that’s it.
Stood up.
Little packet of wet wipes in my pocket.
Cleaned myself up…
(continues laughing)
and walked out of there light as a feather.
(sighs)
Did you believe that?
Did he do you in the hole?
Huh?
No.
I bet he didn’t.
Even at that age, they were scared of you.
(sets bottle down)
Where were you when he was fucking me up the hole?
Huh?
He done me proper.
He done me proper.
(picks up bottle)
Didn’t have much luck with fathers, did we?
How about some tunes?
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
(breath trembling)
(arrow whooshes)
(animal screeches)
(birds calling)
(birds chirping)
JEM: Fucking hell.
Fucking pig.
(laughing) What’s wrong with you?
(continues laughing)
All right? (continues laughing) Fucking hell.
What you doing that for?
(Ray continues laughing)
(Jem chuckles) What are you doing that for, hmm?
What are you doing that for?
What?
Just chucking ’em in your mouth.
(continues laughing)
♪ ♪
(sniffs)
I’m not gonna eat them now.
♪ ♪
(engine revving)
MOTORCYCLIST: You all right?
I’m fucking crossing there, you fucking twat!
MOTORCYCLIST: Look where you’re fucking going, you stupid…
(motorcyclist’s shouting fades in distance)
HATTIE: Nessa?
Nessa.
Hattie?
(indistinct chatter nearby)
(Nessa chuckles)
Look at you in your white coat.
Oh, don’t get ahead of yourself.
I’m only a trainee, Nessa.
It looks good on you, though.
Even the cleaners get white coats in the chemist.
(laughing)
Have you finished uni?
Mmmm.
Finals coming up this year.
This is my workplace training.
Right.
I’m-I’m glad I ran into you, Nessa.
I’ve not heard from Brian for an age now.
Is he all right?
What?
What?
♪ ♪
(rain pattering)
(sets ashtray down)
I really hurt him, Hattie.
I don’t know what I… I-I don’t actually know.
I just… I… I couldn’t stop myself.
I have, uh…
I hurt him badly.
What did he say to you?
I can’t even remember, Hattie.
(scoffs) Well, I can.
But… (sighs) just-just usual stupid shit.
About him?
I just…
Fuck, I just…
(groans) I just…
(sighs softly)
(birds chirping)
You were in East Tyrone, right?
Ooh, let me just cast my mind back for a moment.
Wrong.
You know exactly where I were.
Crossmaglen.
Bandit country.
There were an IRA active service unit operating in the area, doing all sorts.
They were very good, very skillful.
Cunning, ghosting back and forth across the border.
It were cat and mouse.
Sometimes we were the cats, sometimes they were.
As often as not, you weren’t even sure which.
You could have them in your sights with the safety catch off.
Meantime, they’d have a high-velocity round merrily winging its way toward the back of your head.
Just in the week before we’d dug in… we found and defused three massive IEDs of theirs.
They shot and killed one of our dog handlers and the dog.
And they shot down a fucking helicopter.
One week’s work.
Provo Army Council expected results.
(sighs)
And they weren’t disappointed.
Incendiaries, IEDs, grenades, mortars, sniper rifles, heavy machine guns.
Were better-equipped than we were.
What happened?
(Jem sniffs)
(sighs)
(wind howling)
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
(heavy, shaky breathing)
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
(breathing heavily)
(grunts softly)
(sets mug down)
(sniffs, grunts)
♪ ♪
(birds chirping)
♪ ♪
(gun barrel clicks in place)
(door opens)
Are they the flowers our dad used to grow?
Anemones?
♪ ♪
NESSA: I’ll write as if you’ve read all my other letters. The desire to talk to you and share everything is strong. However, this isn’t about me. This is about Brian. Brian needs you. Never before have I asked you in this way. He’s in trouble.
(picks up keys)
(rock music playing quietly)
(distant footsteps)
(distant door opens)
(distant door closes)
(door opens)
(clock ticking quietly)
(rustling nearby)
RAY: You leaving?
Accommodation not good enough for you?
When you legged it, every day, Nessa wrote to you.
How long was it?
When you went limping off into the woods, she didn’t want to interfere with your decision.
For a couple of years, we thought you’d just turn up one day.
She had no idea if you got her letters, let alone if you read them.
You knew she were pregnant.
You never answered her once.
You’ve been going through my things?
Fuck off back to Toytown, you fucking ape.
Got my girl, got my son, got my life.
What more do you fucking want?
It was you that left. You.
Get over yourself, lad.
It’s not about you. Fact.
It’s about Brian.
Poor only child of a deranged fugitive.
Didn’t you want to give him some brothers and sisters to play with?
You’re a big lump of a lad.
Don’t tell me you were firing blanks.
She prayed for you every night, Ray.
Still prays for you.
Tell her to save her fucking breath.
And our dad prayed for you, too, every day for the rest of his life.
Have you gone soft?
That miserable bastard?
Oh, he prayed.
He prayed, didn’t he?
Prayed every time he took his belt off.
Didn’t he pray again afterwards?
Wet under the arms from the efforts of his labor.
Oh, he prayed regular.
We learnt our violence from the number one regional champion, and he had some stiff competition.
Who knows, maybe at the… the British Legion dominoes championships, he’s life and soul.
Blazer, badge, regimental tie, chest out front, just the long-range desert patrol.
Now, that were war.
Sand for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
If Rommel didn’t get you, the flies surely would.
He didn’t talk like that.
That’s right, he didn’t fucking talk at all, did he?
I’ve had plenty of fucking time to fill in the fucking silence for him.
What do you want from me, brother?
You’d know if you read the letter.
I’ve read the fucking letter.
I’ve read the fucking letter.
What the fuck?
What do you want?
(breathing heavily)
I’m beyond your reach, Jem.
I’m well beyond her reach.
There’ll be no epiphany.
So fuck off back to your little family and sort it out.
You don’t want me to leave, Ray.
Why in God’s name did you let that boy join army in the first fucking place?
This is nowt to do with me.
This is on you, mate.
Look, though I’ve raised the boy, do you think he’s not a pigheaded little bastard like you are?
(chuckles) It were nowt to do with me.
I said my piece.
I didn’t think he should do it, follow in our footsteps.
I thought he were just chasing after…
Anyway, regardless of what I think or don’t think, do you honestly believe that your son wouldn’t do a thing just ’cause somebody told him not to?
♪ ♪
JEM: Look, he’s currently absent without leave.
And as much as they like him, you know as well as I do there’s no warm, fuzzy feeling in the MOD.
There’s only so long they’ll turn a blind eye.
Maybe a week, if we’re lucky.
And then the MPs will come knocking and take him away.
But that’s the least of it.
I’ve seen my share of lost souls, Ray, and at this moment, your son is in the dark.
Believer or nonbeliever, there are forces at work.
Fact.
(sighs)
I don’t want anything from you, Ray.
II don’t want anything.
Nessa… Nessa believes that if you met him and talked to him, gave him some answers, it just might make a difference.
It might.
♪ ♪
JEM: Before it’s too late.
(pulls chain switch)
(wood creaking)
(footsteps)
(creaking)
Brian savaged this lad.
He fucking savaged him.
He’s convinced himself if… if they hadn’t pulled him off, he’d have killed him.
And this has been following Brian since primary school.
“Your father’s this, your father’s that.”
“He’s in the nuthouse.”
“Is he banged up?”
The invisible man, Ray Stoker.
Please.
Just tell me.
If you’re not gonna help out, then I’m gonna get out of here double-time.
♪ ♪
(sighs)
I fancy a bevvy.
(quiet chatter)
NESSA: He’s still conscious?
That’s-that’s good.
Could you just ask the children to move out of the way?
We don’t want them seeing this, do we?
A blanket on…
Yeah, a blanket on him is fine.
WOMAN (over phone): And, uh, do I move him?
No, do not move him.
WOMAN: But he’s in the way.
I repeat that, do not move him, madam.
And do not remove his helmet.
You’re doing so well.
(woman sobbing over phone) I know there’s a lot of blood.
(footsteps)
(bell clanging in distance)
SHEILA: Why, he were all over me at that stage, like a bloody octopus.
And I were, like, whipping my head back and forth, just trying to catch a clean breath.
But he must have thought I was in ecstasy, ’cause that minging wet gob of his just kept reaching for me.
Oh, my… He wasn’t gonna back down, but…
I’m not lying.
His breath smelt like shit, Nessa.
(chuckling): Have you ever had that?
(wind whistling softly)
Thank you.
(video game music playing in background) Here you are.
Cheers, mate.
(coins clinking)
And here’s some crisps.
I know you like them.
Cheese and onion.
This thing’s out of juice, mate.
I won’t be long.
Won’t be long.
(sighs softly)
(phone ringing)
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
NESSA: He’s beautiful, kind, funny, loyal. He’s so like you in so many ways. Funny that, eh? Anyway, I implore you, for the sake of Brian, to please, please come home and talk to him.
♪ ♪
Let him meet you at least. And maybe, just maybe he can move forward and let go of whatever demon anger is holding him so tight. I pray you are well and see fit to answer. God bless. Love always, Nessa.
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
(“Teenage Lust” by The Jesus and Mary Chain playing quietly)
(Jem exhales)
What?
What?
What? What the fuck?
Spitting image.
What?
Spitting image.
Spitting image? Who?
(chuckling) Fuck off.
Fuck right off.
Our father who art in heaven?
Fuck off.
(laughing):
Suppose I am a bit.
Suppose I am a bit of a sad old bugger.
He been doing all right, were he?
Who?
The boy.
“The boy,” Brian, is doing well, very well.
They think he’s a real prospect.
Can’t help himself.
The other lads just fall in behind him.
That right?
(chuckles): Yeah.
You remember what it’s like when you’re cold and hungry, you haven’t slept in three nights.
It’s every man for himself.
With Brian…
(exhales sharply)
he’s got strength to spare.
He may be at the end of his rope, but he’s still looking out for the others.
And they pay attention to that.
(Jem exhales)
RAY: Hmm.
When you did selection and, uh, were badged into the regiment, I was so proud.
And I was so fucking envious.
I thought, “I want that. I want some of that.”
Suppose volunteering for 14 Int were a way of getting closer, you know.
The training at Bradbury Lines with your lads and all, I thought it were within reach, but…
(sniffs)
Weren’t ’cause of me that he signed up.
‘Cause of you.
Even with all the shit that he put up with over the years, it was some idea he had, it were…
It was the space where you should’ve been that he was chasing after, that he was fascinated by.
Now he’s frightened of his own shadow.
He doesn’t know who you are.
Knows nothing about you.
Except for the old stories when we were youngsters.
You know, the short fuse, street fights, vandalism.
(chuckling): You and me both, we were both liabilities then.
But now he, uh…
I don’t know, he looks at his hands as though they belong to somebody else.
What?
Rumors, mate. Rumors.
Until you tell me what happened, that’s all we’ve got.
(insects trilling)
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
(birds chirping)
(Nessa breathing deeply)
(door creaks open)
(door closes)
(Nessa takes deep, shaky breath)
NESSA: I realize I’ve never properly spoken to you about your father.
And that was a fault in me, Brian.
Me and Jem thought we could make a nice life for you, and-and I think in some ways we have.
But it can’t have been easy for you… all these years.
You know, it looming over everything.
Every family dinner.
Every birthday, every Christmas, every special occasion.
And I suppose, by not talking to you about it… it were my way of protecting you from it.
How much do you know about the early Troubles in Northern Ireland?
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
(radio static crackling)
(thunder crashes)
(frantic, distorted radio chatter)
(radio chatter intensifies)
(radio chatter stops abruptly)
(wind howling)
(thunder rumbling)
(thunder rumbling)
We’ll sleep outside tonight.
NESSA: I lost him in stages.
I lost him in stages.
After the first few tours in Northern Ireland, he were already quite hard to reach.
And then when he volunteered for some special assignment, the minute he raised his hand, he… he seemed to disappear into another world.
Oh, but it wasn’t just that.
He wanted it.
He were alive, eager.
He said goodbye well before he left.
And when he came back, you couldn’t reach him.
You’d be sat at kitchen table with him, and he’d be looking at you like you were at the other side of a football pitch and you’re an acquaintance, you know, maybe, and he were trying to figure out who you were.
I were pregnant with you.
And I were getting bigger by the day, and he seemed to be shrinking.
I-I… (scoffs) I felt like a big lumbering giant living with a miniature person, afraid I were going to crush him underfoot, but…
Then one day he were gone, and I… realized I’d been waiting for it.
♪ ♪
(thunder rumbling softly)
Ray never spoke to me about what happened over there.
I tried to get in touch with a… you know, a few of the lads that he served with, you know, that were with him, but they said nothing.
They were on a warning from the MOD.
They must have been on a warning.
So all I have is what I’m telling you now.
But I knew Ray.
I knew Ray better than I knew myself.
And as I said, those lads, they couldn’t say owt.
(sighs)
But I tell you this muchthey loved him and they respected him.
And they never gave me… never gave me one hint of a reason that he’d done something he should be ashamed of.
♪ ♪
But he left us, didn’t he?
He left us.
What’s that, Mum?
Something to be proud of?
Why’d he leave?
Huh? Why did he leave us?
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
(wind howling softly)
War crime.
That’s what he called ita war crime.
Fucking war crime me?
The war were the fucking crime.
And we were the phantom soldiers.
Our mission on this one were surveillance, pure and simple.
We dug in at nighttime.
Two OPs.
Ours were in a hedgerow at the end of an unpaved laneway bordering the farm buildings.
The structure of interest were the milking shed no more than 30, 40 feet from us across the yard.
On a tipoff, we’d scouted it a few nights before.
They arrived shortly after sunup.
The bomb maker were a player well-known to us.
The young lad with him, we’d never seen him before.
Our intel was solid, but… for two days, there were no movement.
We started to wonder if they’d somehow slipped away, if there were a… a tunnel or concealed entrance we’d missed when we recced the building.
I was just writing up my report when the bomb went off.
The explosion was so loud you couldn’t hear it.
The concussive force ran through every cell of your body.
Filled you up, like there were nothing left of you.
Just chaos.
The entire roof lifted off the shed on a cloud of black smoke, like a cartoon.
Walls swelled outwards, opened up.
Debris started to rain down on us.
“Are we being attacked? Do they know we’re here? Are they getting rid of it?”
They’d do that sometimes.
You know how it were.
If they… they thought you were onto them, they’d detonate the ordnance and scarper.
And we were waiting for the incoming, but so far, there were nothing.
Then there were just the sound of this fella screaming.
Like I said, we were on surveillance, nothing more.
We weren’t equipped for anything serious.
Sidearms only, couple of longs between us.
When that Semtex went off, we should’ve called it in, hand it over to your lads, but…
(chuckling):
I don’t know why, but… for some reason, we moved in.
Advance to contact.
I suppose it were a “ride to the sound of the guns” type of madness.
We started to crawl toward the milking shed.
Could’ve been weapons trained on us, snipers.
Could’ve been another bomb waiting in the building.
We didn’t know.
(birds calling)
So we’re crawling, heads down, getting closer, getting closer.
All we could…
The only sound were the screaming.
Obviously, we wanted to get one of them alive, if we could, get him to talk.
It were that smoky in the building you could barely see in front of you.
Well, it turned out it were just the two of them, master and apprentice.
And the player must have been stood between the bomb and the kid.
There were nowt left of him.
Except his fucking teeth, buried in the side of the young fella’s head.
Heard it were his nephew a few days later.
And I must have slipped when we went in on some… piece of him, because I were covered in, you know…
When I picked myself up, I were covered in his slime.
The kid were on the ground.
Bits of him were…
He were alive, just about, but bits of him were missing.
His innards were spilled out, and he were crying out for his mother.
Bomb maker’s teeth buried in the side of his head.
I was stood right over him.
Our three lads clearing the room left and right.
I’m stood over him.
He were dying, this kid, Jem.
He were dying.
I could see the fear in his eyes.
The fucking hatred.
He looked at me with hatred.
Couldn’t have been more than 16 or 17 years old.
Younger than Brian is now.
He’s screaming at me.
Begging me to shoot him.
So I shot him.
He were dying?
Yes, Jem, he were fucking dying. He fucking…
I didn’t fucking kill him.
He killed himself.
Fucking killed himself.
I just nudged him across the line.
Fucking little bastard.
Where were they gonna put that bomb? In a pub?
In a shopping center?
In a nightclub?
Guaranteed, there’d be innocent people blown to bits.
How fucking merciful.
Turns out they just killed themselves.
And I’m the fucking murderer?
I wish… I wish I had left him to die.
I wish I’d left him to his full measure of suffering.
Lying there with his guts spilled out, crying for his mother.
I should’ve left him there.
Should’ve called an ambulance.
Told ’em to take the scenic route.
I’m not fucking making out I did him a favor, but I fucking did.
He were begging me to do it.
17 years old, shivering on the ground, and I finished him off.
Just to stop the screaming.
And that’s it.
That’s all there were.
Yeah, listen, of course they… lads knew.
The lads… lads knew what I’d done.
They didn’t question it.
They knew this fella were gone and no one would get anything out of him.
By the time we got him anywhere, hehe wouldn’t have survived.
No one said a word.
No one questioned it.
(birds calling)
No one said a word.
But I called it into South Det operations room.
That stage, our job were done.
Handed over, went back to barracks, had the debrief.
That boy’s injuries-didn’t occur to me any questions would be asked, but…
They were all in a twist.
The Ruperts, the higherups.
So, after… the CO had me in his office.
Uh…
I could tell he were under stress.
His whole fat head looked like a boil that needed lancing.
“By all the rules of lawful engagement, that’s a war crime, Sergeant Stoker.”
Oh, hello. Here we go.
He’s looking hard at me.
“We need to make this go away.
“He presented a threat. He raised his weapon.”
“No, he fucking didn’t, sir.”
I shouted in his face, “No, he fucking didn’t.”
(voice shaking):
“His arms were shredded.”
(crying):
I said, “I want to get out.”
Hehe said, “You can’t.”
He said, “Pull yourself together and don’t be thick.
“Take a couple of days, see the head doctor, you’ll be right as rain. We’ll make this go away.” So…
I’m stood in front… front of him, hot tears squirting out of me.
If you’d asked me what my name were, I wouldn’t have known.
(sobbing)
So I…
I took a couple of days, but… it-it weren’t that long for the shrink to see there were a crack in the ice that wouldn’t heal over.
I were…
I were, as he put it…
Hey.
…an unstable element.
Danger to myself and others, which, in our line of work, meant generally bad for business.
Time to go home.
So he declared me unfit, “return to unit.”
Signed me out, put me on a plane back to my regiment.
Short while later, I find myself on the streets of Sheffield, staring at my old front door.
A civilian… and a… a dirty little s-secret war criminal.
Yeah, well, I were coming up 15 years’ service, due out anyway.
(sighs)
Could you have saved him?
I did save him, Jem.
I did save him.
Saved him from more fucking pain.
I’d have enjoyed watching him suffer a little bit longer, so I did save him-saved him from that.
Why did you shoot him?
Could we have kept him alive?
(sniffles) At the t-time, I knew we couldn’t.
At the time.
(sighing):
At the time.
♪ ♪
(takes deep breath)
(quietly):
Hey.
We’ve all done things.
We’ve all done things, Ray.
I don’t need your fucking absolution, Jem.
Maybe I could’ve saved him.
Maybe I couldn’t have saved him.
Maybe I enjoyed killing him.
Maybe I didn’t.
Maybe I pitied him.
Maybe I fucking hated him.
I don’t know, Jem. I don’t know.
But I don’t need your fucking absolution.
I did the crime.
I’m still serving the time.
I don’t owe nowt to nobody.
I don’t owe nowt to nobody.
Least of all to you.
(sighs heavily)
(chuckles)
How many fucking Hail Marys do I get for that?
(wind howling)
(footsteps receding)
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
NESSA: And he goes silent, morose.
His eyes searching for the exit.
Well, there were rumors, as you only know too well, that he’d lost his mind over there, that… you know, he’d… he’d gone psycho, that he’d been involved in some bad things.
Even that he’d murdered an unarmed civilian.
Oh, and the shame.
The shame of it seemed to crush him.
I mean, regardless of what happened, the shame.
It’s hard to imagine that, you know, what shame can do to a person.
He was a very proud man, your father, Brian.
He was very proud.
Proud?
You don’t understand.
He put his heart and soul into soldiering. Proud?
Just like your dad, Jem, you know?
Listen to yourself, Mum.
So… so to take that away from somebody, to take it away from him, it’s like taking his name away.
How can you be so fucking reasonable about it?
Oh, I wasn’t reasonable about it at the time.
You know, and if it… if it wasn’t for knowing that there was a baby on the way, and if it… if it wasn’t for you…
I don’t know what I would’ve done.
So, yeah.
He left us.
I’m sorry.
And is that what you think, or is that what you know?
(Brian sniffles)
‘Cause this is what I think, Mum.
I think he were a fucking killer and a coward.
Because only a weak, cowardly person can walk away from their family like that.
Don’t talk about him.
You don’t know him.
No, you’re right.
I don’t know him.
That’s the problem, innit?
I don’t fucking know him.
I know everything I fucking need to know about that bastard.
And that he’s a big, giant fucking sinkhole in the middle of our lives.
Don’t talk about him like that.
Don’t talk about anybody like that in my presence.
Least of all the man who gave you life, which is a blessed thing.
Blessed? Blessed?
Why does everything have to be so fucking blessed in this house, Mum?
You gave me life.
He gave me a fucking… fucking curse.
♪ ♪
JEM: All these years.
(thunder rumbling)
All these years.
(thunder rumbling)
“All these years,” fucking what?
How did you…
The winters, I mean, the isolation.
How did I what?
How did I manage without you?
It’s not over, Jem.
You make it sound as if it…
I mean…
I won’t pretend I don’t think about it from time to time, but this is it, Jem.
This is my life.
Does it have to be?
“As for man, “his days are as grass: as a flower of the field, so it flourisheth. For the wind passeth over it, and it is gone; and the place thereof shall know it no more.”
Et cetera, et cetera.
A-fucking-men.
Good night, Ray.
(faint birdcalls)
(wind whistling softly)
(heavy breathing)
(breath trembling)
(wind howling)
(footsteps sloshing)
(deep, raspy inhale)
(long exhale)
♪ ♪
(deep, raspy inhale)
RAY: Brian?
(long exhale)
Brian?
(quiet, raspy breathing)
♪ ♪
(muffled, echoing heartbeat)
♪ ♪
(music stops abruptly)
(wind whistling)
(breath trembling)
(birds chirping)
(sighs softly)
(dart strikes dartboard)
(thunder rumbling)
(grunting softly)
(loud thud)
(glass crackles)
(thunder continues rumbling)
(loud thud)
(gasps)
(breath trembling softly)
(rapid thudding)
(wind howling)
(wind continues howling)
(rapid thudding and howling wind continue)
(phones ringing)
(car alarms blaring)
(rapid thudding and howling wind continue)
(muffled, indistinct radio chatter)
(car alarms continues blaring)
(wind howling)
(audio muted)
(rapid thudding and howling wind resume)
(breathing heavily)
(no dialogue)
(rapid thudding and howling wind continue)
(rapid thudding and howling wind continue)
(rapid thudding and howling wind stop abruptly)
(water trickling gently)
(wind moaning softly)
(distant birdcalls)
(birds chirping)
(water flowing gently)
(grunts softly)
(sniffling quietly)
(burbling)
♪ ♪
(leaves rustling in wind)
♪ ♪
(birds calling, chirping)
JEM: Hey.
I’ve got to get going.
(groans)
What are you doing?
Fucking hell.
(grunting)
(chuckles)
(grunting and groaning)
(grunting and groaning continue)
(choking)
(strained grunting)
(choking)
(both breathing heavily)
(grunting)
(breathing heavily)
(grunts softly)
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
(no dialogue)
♪ ♪
♪ ♪
(music fades)
