Hostage chums reunite for film 

BY KIM JANSSEN

FORMER Beirut hostages Brian Keenan and John McCarthy toasted
 the silver screen version of their incredible story at the Tricycle 
Cinema on Monday.
More than a decade after their release, the unlikely pairing of 
a working class teacher from Northern Ireland and the boarding 
school-educated journalist sent to report on his capture helped to 
raise nearly £10,000 for torture victims at the Kilburn High Road 
charity premiere.
The film, Blind Flight, was due to star Joseph Fiennes in 2002 but 
lost funding after the World Trade Center atrocity as backers shied 
away from controversial subjects.
Shot last year on a small budget, the finished film features Linus Roache 
and Ian Hart in the lead roles.
Mr McCarthy told the New Journal he had never entertained the thought of 
his story being filmed during the five-and-a-half years he was held 
hostage during the civil war in Lebanon.
But Mr Keenan, who spent four-and-a-half years locked up with Mr McCarthy, 
revealed himself as a keen movie buff.
He said: “Growing up, I loved the original film version of Sons and 
Lovers and I was a huge fan of Ken Russell.
“I was taken with European film. In some ways the European cinema still 
has things that Hollywood doesn’t and that the British cinema certainly 
doesn’t, although the director Jonny Furse did a fantastic job on our film.
“At one point someone suggested getting Anthony Hopkins to play me but 
I said: ‘He’s older than me, less good looking and he eats people.’”
BBC journalist Jeremy Bowen hosted a question-and-answer session after 
the film, during which Mr McCarthy revealed he and Mr Keenan had practised 
ballet in the makeshift cells during their hostage ordeal.
Mr Keenan added: “I honestly don’t think about it any more but the public 
make you.
“If you’re eating in the same restaurant they’ll point and say ‘there’s your 
man – the hostage’.”