Colin Firth’s emotional reaction at meeting Lockerbie disaster victim's dad
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When Pan Am flight 103 exploded above Lockerbie, Scotland, on the night of 21 December 1988, the first thing some residents heard was a tinkling sound, almost like Christmas bells. It was actually the noise of hundreds of knives, forks and spoons being propelled through the sky as the plane shattered and bodies, seats, luggage and broken parts of the aircraft fell on to the town and surrounding fields.
The destruction and horror of that night is vividly depicted in new five-part drama Lockerbie: A Search For Truth and director Otto Bathurst felt privileged to bring it to the screen for the first time. “This was a time before smartphones, before anything like the internet,” he explains. “So you have this whole event that has never been visualised before, and, from a director’s point of view, you are creating this world for the first time.”.
It was the small details that weren’t mentioned in the news reports that Otto wanted to highlight, such as the first things residents of Lockerbie heard and saw. “Everyone had a detail about that night – the spoons I got from someone who heard the tinkling of silver first of all,” he says. “It is told with respectfulness, sensitivity and truthfulness.”.
The series is based on the true events of the disaster, and focuses on one man’s three-decade fight for justice and truth. Colin Firth stars as Jim Swire, whose 23-year-old daughter Flora was on board the flight. Jim became the spokesperson for the UK victims’ families and, with his wife Jane (Catherine McCormack), he set out to discover how much the security services knew in advance, and just who was responsible for the murder of 259 passengers and crew and 11 residents of Lockerbie.
