The Devil's Own

In 1972, eight-year-old Frankie McGuire witnesses his father killed as an Irish republican sympathizer. Twenty years later in Belfast, adult Frankie and three other IRA members engage in a gun battle with the British Army and Special Reconnaissance Unit ('The Det'). One gunman is killed, another, Desmond, is wounded as Frankie and Sean Phelan flee. Frankie and friend Martin MacDuff, seeing a British Army helicopter circling above, decide they need Stinger missiles.

Frankie travels to New York City as "Rory Devaney" to buy missiles. IRA sympathizer Judge Peter Fitzsimmons has procured Frankie a construction job as a cover and arranged for him to stay with NYPD Sergeant Tom O'Meara, his wife, Sheila, and their three daughters on Staten Island. The O'Meara family warmly welcome Frankie into their household, unaware of his true identity.

Meanwhile, Sean acquires an old fishing boat for him and Frankie to transport missiles to Ireland. Frankie meets with black market arms dealer and Irish mobster Billy Burke. Frankie agrees to pay Burke upon delivery of the missiles in six to eight weeks. Judge Fitzsimmons raises the money and sends his family nanny, Megan Doherty, to deliver it to Frankie. Megan later calls Frankie, saying that Martin was killed, postponing the deal with Burke.

Meanwhile, Tom's partner, Eddie Diaz, fatally shoots an unarmed thief in the back as he runs away. Following an intense investigation, Tom decides to retire from the force. When Tom and Sheila arrive home, masked intruders are waiting. Sheila calls 911 as Tom fights them off. Frankie arrives and aids Tom, but they are subdued. As police sirens approach, Tom persuades the men to escape while they still can.

Frankie later confronts Burke, knowing he ordered the attack. Burke demands Frankie pay him or he will kill the captive Sean. Frankie goes to collect the money he hid at the O'Meara house, but Tom has found it and forces Frankie to reveal his true identity. Eddie arrives, and he and Tom arrest Frankie. En route to the police station, Frankie escapes, killing Eddie. As the FBI and British authorities interrogate Tom about Frankie, he realizes their mission is to execute Frankie.

Meeting Burke in a warehouse, Burke's thug tosses Sean's severed head at Frankie's feet. Rather than handing over the money, Frankie gives them a bomb-laden bag that explodes when opened. Frankie grabs a gun, killing Burke and his men, then drives off with the missiles. At the Fitzsimmons' residence, Frankie tells Megan to alert his comrades that he is leaving that night to return to Ireland with the missiles.

Tom crashes the Fitzsimmons' cocktail party and confronts the judge. Tom recognizes Megan from a photo in Frankie's bag. Frankie, hiding upstairs, escapes. Tom persuades Megan to reveal where Frankie is going by promising to protect him from being assassinated. Jumping aboard the boat as it leaves the dock, Tom and Frankie shoot at each other, wounding both. Frankie, seemingly having the upper hand, hesitates to shoot Tom, then collapses. They embrace each other, recognizing that both were fighting for causes they believe in. Frankie dies, and Tom, though badly wounded, steers the boat back to shore.

The film's origins date back to the 1980's, it began as a pitch by producers Lawrence Gordon and Robert F. Colesberry, the producers hired screenwriter Kevin Jarre to write the first draft, as Gordon recalled "Jarre had disappeared for a couple of years and came back with a wonderful screenplay"[6] Gordon acquired the script in 1990.[7] In 1991, Gordon took the script to Brad Pitt, who was not yet well-known at the time, Pitt enthusiastically accepted the script, which Gordon recalled "was supposed to be a gritty, low-budget thriller with Brad as the only star", the project began moving forward towards pre-production, however the project was left at a standstill due to Pitt's none too impressive acting credits at the time, as well as the politically controversial subject matter on which the story was based. In the ensuing years interest in the project was renewed thanks to Pitt's performances in Legends of the Fall, Interview with the Vampire, and 12 Monkeys, but the studio was of the opinion that Pitt could not carry a major film alone, for the role of Tom O'Meara, both Gene Hackman and Sean Connery had been considered at various points, but at Pitt's suggestion, Harrison Ford was approached for the role, which at that time was more of a character role. Ford agreed, though that meant the script had to be rewritten to create a fuller role for Ford and a more complicated relationship between the characters played by the two men. To expand Ford's role, producers brought in David Aaron Cohen and Vincent Patrick to rewrite Jarre's script, as Patrick stated "There was no way they were going to shoot the original script. It had to become a two-hero piece with equal action heroes. Supporting two stars is what this was about"[8] It was Ford's suggestion to bring Pakula in as director. Principal photography started in February 1996, with the script "still in flux"; according to The New York Times, "ego clashes, budget overruns and long delays plagued the project."[8][9][1][2] Pitt "threatened to quit early in the shoot, complaining that the script was incomplete and incoherent" and later "denounced the movie as 'the most irresponsible bit of film making – if you can even call it that – that I've ever seen.'"[8] The producers hired screenwriter Terry George to help further develop Pitt's character. In March 1996, Pakula hired screenwriter Robert Mark Kamen to provide rewrites during production, Kamen noted the difficulties on set as he recalled "They were running out of script to shoot. They had a script that wasn't acceptable to either actor, Alan [Pakula] didn't start with a script that everyone had signed off on, we were flying blind....It was scary". Kamen met with both Ford and Pitt to discuss their ideas about improving the script, contrary to the rumors, Kamen insisted that both actors were agreeable to each other, "It wasn't the tension between them that made things tense. It was the tension each had with their own parts."

According to Pakula, one problem was that the film's plot did not fall along conventionally simple Hollywood lines, as Ford and Pitt were both playing "good guys" according to each of their own distinct moral codes. The New York Times characterized Ford's character as "the upright American cop who deplores violence" and Pitt's as "an I.R.A. gunman for whom violence is a reasonable solution to his people's 300 years of troubles."[8] Pakula compared his intent with the two characters to that depicted in Red River, a 1948 western in which John Wayne's character is defied by his young protégé, played by Montgomery Clift.[8]

The Devil's Own was filmed on location and at the Chelsea Piers studios in New York City, as well as in Newark, Hoboken, Jersey City, Bayonne, Sandy Hook and Montclair, New Jersey.[10] and Greenport, New York on Long Island. The opening scenes were filmed at Port Oriel, Clogherhead, County Louth, Republic of Ireland. The Belfast shootout scenes were filmed in Inchicore, Dublin in July 1996. Other location shoots in Ireland were in the Dublin Mountains. Two months before it opened, the film was still unfinished: Pakula was unhappy with the final scene ("a showdown on a boat with a cargo of Stinger missiles"), so in early February the scene was "rewritten and reshot over two days in a studio in California."[8]

The Devil's Own received mixed reviews from critics. On Rotten Tomatoes it has a rating of 35% based on 40 reviews, with an average rating of 5.3/10.[11] On Metacritic it has a score of 53/100, based on reviews from 26 critics.[12] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B-" on an A+ to F scale.[13]

In retrospect, Brad Pitt said: "I really like Devil's Own. It was a good schooling for me. Still, I think the movie could have been better. Literally, the script got thrown out."[14]

Harrison Ford is also very fond of the movie: "I also think it is a really good movie although we had a real hard time making it but, Alan [Pakula] made, I think, a really good movie out of it."[15]

Roger Ebert gave the film 2½ stars out of 4, saying it showed "ignorance of the history of Northern Ireland" and that "the issues involved between the two sides are never mentioned." The review criticised the contrived plot, stating "The moral reasoning in the film is so confusing that only by completely sidestepping it can the plot work at all." Pitt and Ford were praised, with Ebert complimenting the pair, describing them as "enormously appealing and gifted actors, and to the degree that the movie works, it's because of them."[16]

James Berardinelli gave the film 2½ stars out of 4, saying:

For much of its running length, The Devil's Own works as a passable thriller. Certain plot elements (including many of the details surrounding the missile deal) border on preposterous, but that often goes with the territory in films of this genre. The best parts of The Devil's Own are the quiet moments, such as when Frankie and Tom are talking, or when Tom is spending time with his family. There's also an effective subplot that forces Tom to examine his moral outlook on life when his partner (Ruben Blades) accidentally shoots a fleeing suspect in the back. Unfortunately, The Devil's Own goes downhill fast in the final half-hour. Suddenly, it's as if every significant character in the film has undergone a frontal lobotomy. Otherwise-intelligent men start doing extremely stupid things, and the entire "dumbing-down" process becomes frustrating to observe. The final scenes are solid, but the stuff that leads up to them is a problem.[17]

Janet Maslin called it an "unexpectedly solid thriller" with a "first-rate, madly photogenic performance" by Pitt; she notes that it is "directed by Alan J. Pakula in a thoughtful urban style that recalls the vintage New York stories of Sidney Lumet" and "handsomely photographed by Gordon Willis".[18] Richard Schickel called it "quite a good movie – a character-driven (as opposed to whammy-driven) suspense drama – dark, fatalistic and, within its melodramatically stretched terms, emotionally plausible"; he said Pakula "develops his story patiently, without letting its tensions unravel."[19] Entertainment Weekly gave it a "B+," calling it a "quiet, absorbing, shades-of-gray drama, a kind of thriller meditation on the schism in Northern Ireland."[20]

A reviewer for Salon.com called it "a disjointed, sluggish picture" with a problematic script that "bears the marks of tinkering": "swatches of the story appear to be missing, relationships aren't clearly defined, and characters aren't identified."[21]

Variety said:

Whatever contortions the script went through on its way to the result, Pakula has managed to maintain an admirable concentration on the central moral equation, which posits the Irish terrorist's understandable political and emotional motivations for revenge versus the decent cop's sense of justice and the greater human good.[22]

The film grossed $140 million, exceeding its $90 million budget, of which $43 million was from North America.

The film was involved in adverse publicity when, two months before her death, Diana, Princess of Wales took 15-year-old Prince William, and 12-year-old Prince Harry, to see the movie. The movie was restricted to movie-goers aged 15 or older, and the Princess persuaded the cinema to let Prince Harry stay despite him being three years underage. She was criticised for flouting the law, for using her influence to persuade the cinema's employees to flout the law, and because of the movie's subject matter (which was said to glamorise the IRA – highly sensitive given that her sons' great-uncle Earl Mountbatten was assassinated by the IRA). She later apologised, saying she was unaware of the film's content.[23]

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• The Devil's Own at IMDb
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• Stills from the film from film.virtual-history.com