If one image is emblematic of Roger Michell's acutely observed and immensely powerful Titanic Town, it's a shot of a fully armed soldier staked out for the evening on a freshly cut front lawn, a quaint cul-de-sac transformed into an impromptu battlefield in 1972 Belfast. To Michell, the intrusion of war on everyday lives is at once menacing and comically ridiculous, fusing two worlds that look distinctly uncomfortable next to each other. As the film opens, Bernie McPhelimy, a real-life housewife turned peace crusader, has become so accustomed to the army raiding her neighbors' homes that she orders her children to keep their rooms clean just in case. But the threat to her family and loved ones hits home when her best friend is killed by IRA crossfire while on a grocery run. Naïve but indomitable, McPhelimy leads Women For Peace in negotiating a cease-fire, but she winds up an unwitting political pawn for both sides, also drawing the ire of neighbors who suspect she's betraying her IRA brothers. Played with unbridled ferocity by Julie Walters, McPhelimy is a richly drawn character, tough-minded and courageous yet so preoccupied that she doesn't realize her struggle to keep her children out of harm's way is actually doing just the opposite. The effects of her activism weigh especially heavy on her teenage daughter (Nuala O'Neill), who is having enough trouble coping with the usual trials of adolescence. Half empowerment tale, half coming-of-age drama, Titanic Town spends equal time with the mother and daughter individually, then brings their stories together with great tenderness. Throughout, Michell carefully evokes the absurdity and horror of ordinary lives playing out with war as a backdrop, punctuated by comedy and sudden outbursts of violence. Made in 1998, between the director's superb small-scale adaptation of Jane Austen's Persuasion and his impressive Hollywood debut Notting Hill, Titanic Town has been revived in the U.S. as part of The Shooting Gallery's innovative film series. As with its surprise hit Croupier, another fine British import from '98, it's hard to fathom that such an accomplished and accessible film might have otherwise slipped through the cracks.