The Independent - Date: 14th Jan 02 - James Rampton 
Maura Duffy (nee Young) says, "The experience of seeing the film was overwhelming. It's our story up there on the screen. The last time I cried like that was in 1972, when John died. This brought it all back. Within 15 minutes, Bloody Sunday destroyed so many lives." ….

Eva Birthistle, Maura Duffy (nee Young), Ciaran McMenamin, Leo Young

Four years in the making, 'Sunday' draws on more than 100 interviews with eyewitnesses, relatives and soldiers, as well as sworn testimony to the ongoing Saville Inquiry into Bloody Sunday, to build up a meticulously researched - and breathtakingly powerful - view of what happened. ….

Stephen Gargan, the film's co-producer, and a Derry resident, hopes the drama will spark debate by showing the human cost of the tragedy. "It's difficult to get the British public to engage with the subject of Ireland," he sighs. "It's been a 30-year conflict and in Britain it's just seen as a turn-off. We felt that for a long time the dead were just statistics - they weren't seen as real people. So it was important to communicate that these were good people who had families that loved them and communities that valued them." ….

(Quoting Maura Duffy) "… There will be mothers and fathers and sons and daughters who will all relate to our situation and see that an injustice was done. The film is part of the healing process. We feel a wee bit stronger because now we're sharing it with everyone. We can't achieve closure until the whole truth is out." …

So what does McGovern hope his film will achieve? "My ambition was achieved when I saw the relatives' reaction," he says. "I hope the film will be watched in Britain, but I wrote it hoping that it would be accepted by the families who have campaigned for truth and justice for the past 30 years. If the people of Derry attest to the truth of our film and think it's a fitting requiem for the dead, that's the greatest tribute." Duffy makes a final point about how the film might help their campaign to right the wrongs of Bloody Sunday. "I don't want revenge, I want justice. Anyway, what would [revenge] achieve? It would never soften my feeling of grief." She pauses, before adding in a quiet voice, "And it would never bring back John."

Daily Mirror  - Jeannie Johnston

(Quoting Leo Young) "People can say what they like about the film being anti-British, but I can say that it really did happen like that," he says.
If people in Britain are shocked by this, well, it's about time. For too long, they've been able to ignore that people like me even exist. So many English people will never accept that the army can come and do such a thing." …

"At first I couldn't take it in. Who would be firing shots and why? I knew, everyone knew, that the IRA had said they wouldn't be present on the march. Then the panic started. I knew immediately that I had to find John. He was the youngest. It was up to me to make sure he was OK. But I never did find him. That will haunt me 'til the day I die. Instead I got caught up in the whole horror." …

After Bloody Sunday, he listened to his mother, who urged her sons never to take up arms on John's behalf. Yet he understands why so many young men around him did. "What else do you do?" he asks. "They projected their anger outwards. I just tried to absorb mine, and it didn't work. I became so angry. I started off hating the soldier who pulled the trigger and killed our John. Then I moved on to hating the officer who gave him the order. Then the entire British Army. Then the Government. Pretty soon you find yourself hating the whole damn world."

Belfast Telegraph - Date: 10th Jan 02 - Suzanne Rodgers
" Maura (Duffy nee Young) said, "It was very, very powerful, very overwhelming. You are looking at something that you had in your mind for 30 years and there all of a sudden it's there in front of you." ….
Dr Raymond McClean, who tended to the dead and injured, said he felt 'Sunday' … captured the spirit of Derry. "It is a film made for the people, by the people and of the people," he said.

Jimmy McGovern

Derry Journal Date: 22nd Jan 02 - Brendan McDaid 
(Quoting Jimmy McGovern) "I went into the project thinking that individual members of the parachute regiment were to blame for Bloody Sunday. I no longer think that. I think the blame probably lies in Stormont and at 10 Downing Street. An army that is not controlled by its political masters is no army; it's a rabble. And the parachute regiment is no rabble." 

"There is now the prospect of peace and reconciliation throughout the North. The Saville Inquiry is fundamental to that process but this film too might play a small part in all that. For 30 years truth has been suppressed and justice denied. That is wrong. If Britain does not believe in truth or justice it is no longer worthy of our love." 

The Sunday World - Date: 27th Jan 02 - Kevin McDonnell
(Quoting Jimmy) "Bloody Sunday saw the state killing its own subjects - one of the things that struck me was that the 13 people who died were all taxpayers, so they literally helped pay for the bullets that killed them." …

"…. I found out years ago that I am a patriot… I love my country instinctively and know that everything I love and everything I hold dear is in this country. But I have been juggling with JFK's famous quote 'Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country' and I think it is flawed. If I love my country instinctively I want to know what my country does to prove itself worthy of my love, and the least it can do is uphold truth and justice and if it fails to do that it ceases to be worthy of my love."

Derry Journal - Eamonn Houston
(Quoting Jimmy) "In writing the script and making the film I honestly believe that the story process is more important than the end product - the process is very empowering t the people involved. They told me their stories. The film was shot in Derry, Derry people act in it and I think that this whole process is crucial to the empowerment of the families. The British press have now to address the issue and respond to it. It is no longer their agenda. Unarmed people were shot by the British Army and now they have to respond to that." (and again)

"What is powerful," he contends, "is the deaths and the trauma heaped on the people of Derry. A film has to say more - I think that our film also provides insights and it displays a wonderful humanity. At its best it is a requiem for the dead. If people say that 'Sunday' was a good requiem for their dead, then I will be happy." 

Insider 
" Jimmy is expecting mixed reactions from viewers, and one of the first reactions is bound to be shock. "In Northern Ireland it's not going to be so very shocking, because they know what happened that day. But over here I think it will disturb people that this sort of thing could happen in our name." … While Jimmy knows that some people won't believe the claim that British soldiers shot unarmed civilians, he himself has no doubts. "Fourteen people were murdered that day - it's hard to accept but it's the truth," he says. As far as Jimmy is concerned, its not a question of politics: "Forget the IRA. I'm quite happy to stand up and say they're a bunch of vicious bastards. This in nothing to do with the IRA. These were people marching for civil rights - and they were murdered. Fourteen IRA men weren't murdered. Fourteen innocent, unarmed people were murdered."

The Irish Times - Date: 19th Jan 02 - Kathy Sheridan
"As for the films being 'viciously anti-British", it seems appropriate to let an Englishman, in the articulate form of Jimmy McGovern, say his piece on that: "I speak as a patriotic Englishman, I love my country because I was born there - it's instinctive. But you then look for your country to earn your love and respect, and it does that by upholding truth and justice. And Bloody Sunday spat on those fundamental principles."