Incendiary (film) - Plot

Plot

A young woman (Michelle Williams) is married to bomb-disposal officer Lenny (Nicholas Gleaves); they have a four-year old son (Sidney Johnston).

Mainly the book and the film are about this mother’s love for her child and the loss of that child. There is also a policeman, who is essentially a good man who wants to do the right thing but can’t because he’s got an unseen enemy and he has to make decisions that he wouldn’t normally make and it gets him into trouble. Then there’s a journalist who kind of represents the liberal thinkers in society. All liberal thinkers have had to reassess that attitude since 9/11 because the results of free association, free movement and free expression have put us all in danger in many ways, so everybody’s had to rethink their position. They represent the world before 9/11 and 7/7 and then what happened afterwards, so that’s what it’s about.

While the young mother has sex with reporter Jasper (Ewan McGregor), Lenny, their son and about 1000 others are killed in a terrorist attack carried out by six suicide bombers at a football match. Both Jasper and Lenny's boss, Terrence Butcher (Matthew Macfadyen), who is in charge of the anti-terrorist division, try to comfort the mother; both are also romantically interested in her.

Throughout Jasper's investigations, the mother discovers the identity of one of the terrorists. She befriends his teenage son (Usman Khokhar), who only knows that his father is missing since May Day. When he finds out what his father did, he panics and runs, causing the police to suspect him to be a terrorist. When he tries to take something out of his pocket they think he has a gun or wants to trigger a bomb; they shoot at him, but he is unharmed. The mother, who tried to protect him, is wounded, but not severely. Later, the terrorist's wife and son apologize to the mother for his part in the killings.

Terrence confesses to the mother that he knew that a suicide attack was going to happen and could have stopped it, but he did not in order to be able to continue the investigations; he did not know in which stadium it would happen, and also thought it would be of a smaller scale. Although he knew Lenny and his son would be going, he did not warn them.

Sometimes the mother is confused, thinking that nothing has happened to her son. Another time, for therapeutic reasons she writes a letter addressed to Osama bin Laden, who is assumed to be responsible for the attack.

In the film's final scenes, the mother has another son by Jasper, who is seen running to the hospital.