Director hopes new Troubles series will challenge 'shameful disinterest' from the English

A new documentary series aims to challenge the “shameful disinterest” from the English on the Troubles.

Director James Bluemel made the comments ahead of the broadcast of his new BBC series, Once Upon a Time in Northern Ireland.

“There is a shameful disinterest in England about what happened over there. Maybe it is fatigue or a sense that it is too complicated, we don’t really understand it and it has nothing to do with us,” he told The Times.

“But this was not a sectarian civil war, it was a three-sided triangle with the UK government on one of the sides so there should be an interest. I hope this series is accessible enough to create that or at least shed a bit of understanding and light on it.”

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Although the “bombs, violence, murder and pain” were a regular feature of news bulletins during his youth, he said the human impact on those affected never registered with him.

 “I had been exposed to the politics of the conflict, but I had not heard the human stories from those that were there,” he said.

The five-part series starts on Monday, combining personal accounts with archive footage to tell the story of those who lived through the Troubles and still live with its aftermath.

Having previously helmed Once Upon a Time in Iraq, he said it was much harder to convince people in Northern Ireland to talk.

 “There was a massive desire in Iraq for people to tell their story to anyone that was interested, but that was very different in Belfast,” he said.

“There was much more caution and suspicion about the angle and the agenda of the film. That’s because it’s a small place and there is still stuff going on and it isn’t a past-tense story – there are ramifications.”

Those appearing in the series will include a former IRA member caught up in the events of Bloody Sunday, a former loyalist paramilitary member and a British soldier injured in the conflict.

 “There is a reason our contributors decided to share their stories,” Mr Bluemel said.

“It is because they feel they have something to say, some wisdom to pass on, an emotional knowledge which perhaps has been neglected in the pursuit to define what happened here.”

:: Read our interview with James Bluemel on the making of Once Upon A Time In Northern Ireland in this Saturday's Irish News