The Siege of Jadotville

An account of a siege in the Congo in September 1961, an event that went little known even in Ireland for a long time. An Irish unit serving with the United Nations force is sent to the mining town of Jadotville in Katanga. A hundred and fifty-seven men. Facing them is a force of thousands, and the unit has neither enough ammunition nor any relief coming. The siege runs for days. Commandant Pat Quinlan's defensive scheme is the centre of the film: the trenches, the fields of fire, the counted use of ammunition. The source is Declan Power's 2005 book. The phrase "forgotten battle" in its title is not decorative; the event stayed out of the official account for years and the men who came back went long without the recognition they were owed. The film takes that on directly. Jamie Dornan plays Quinlan and Mark Strong plays the UN representative Conor Cruise O'Brien. It was distributed by Netflix. A solid example for anyone who likes war films drawn from record and siege narratives. For a viewer looking for depth of character, the film weights the combat and most of the soldiers remain one-sentence identities.