Hot Docs Review: Air India 182

Before two airliners crashed into the World Trade Center on September 11, 2001, the 1985 bombing of Air India flight 182 was the deadliest terrorist attack involving an airplane. On June 23, 1985, Air India Flight 181 left Toronto an hour and forty minutes late, stopped in Montreal, became flight 182, and then headed across the Atlantic Ocean bound for London. Just over 100 miles from Ireland, the plane exploded in the air and crashed into the ocean, killing everyone on-board -- 329 people, which included 280 Canadian citizens and 136 children. It was a devastating tragedy, yet it was largely ignored by the world at large, as well as the country that housed the largest number of casualties (Canada).

Almost 23 years later, the story is finally hitting big screens with Sturla Gunnarsson's documentary, Air India 182. Between the tragedy and the time it took for the matter to be resolved in courts almost two decades later, the story of 182 is long and intense. Gunnarsson sorts through it by focusing on how it came to be, rather than its drawn-out aftermath -- the terrorists who planned it, the government officials trying to discern the plan and stop it, and the families who suffered tremendous personal losses in the tragedy.

Each piece is laid out through re-enactments, interviews, old documents, and transcript recitation. The use of re-created scenes is a risque move for a documentary, but in the case of 182, it works. When each of the interviewed subjects talks about the work they did on the case, or the loved ones they said goodbye to, we're offered a tangible scene that makes it real, which is especially effective when the families of the victims talk about their final memories of the murdered passengers. But these recreated scenes also help to keep the story clear. Rather than present a myriad of pictures and names, Gunnarsson allows us to become more intimately familiar with each person -- terrorist, victim, and official -- in a way that flushes out their stories.

At the same time, the film could have survived without them. Each interview is conducted in front of a crisp white background -- a color that not only allows the faces to speak for themselves, but is also "the colour of death in the Indian culture." It's these moments that make the documentary worth seeing. The most powerful scenes are when each person's calm recitation of their memories begins to change as they arrive at the moment in this mess that hits them most -- whether it's the discussion of how one of the suitcases that needed to be examined was waved on by, or the moment a man tries to rationalize why some of his last moments with his wife were full of anger.

The other hard-hitting moments come through real footage of the crash and the victims. Gunnarsson does an excellent job balancing that fine line between a real portrayal of what happened and gratuitous gore. There are some truly unnerving real moments in this documentary, from the eerie shot of a cabbage patch doll being pulled from the sea to video of the victims being loaded onto helicopters. But they are brief and well-chosen. You won't see horrific, slow close-ups of the passengers, but you will see enough to make it real, and pull it out of abstract thought.

While most of the film focuses on the events leading up to the bombing and that infamous day, Gunnarsson does include a brief-rundown of some of the mistakes and idiocy that came after this tragedy, from Brian Mulroney's condolences given to India, as if most of the victims weren't Canadian citizens, to the fact that only one man was convicted in this whole terrible mess. But the trial and aftermath are another story. Air India 182 focuses on making this tragedy real, and allowing those involved to tell their stories -- giving voice to a sad day in our history that has been sadly forgotten by many.

The documentary will air on the CBC this summer, on the anniversary of the bombing.