The Michael Files - 207 Half Life

207 - Half Life
Writer/Director	Maurice Hurley / René Bonniere
Michael's POV Onscreen: 29 minutes	Michael hides from Section the fact that he knows who has been planting bombs, arousing Nikita’s suspicions. He meets secretly with René Dion, a face from the past when he was a member of a radical activist group, L’Heure Sanguine, but he has been followed by Nikita. Later, Michael confides in Nikita about his past and we learn of his sister, who was cared for by René. Because of this debt he doubts whether he can perform the next mission. However he creates a diversion and helps René escape from Section, only to lead him and his entire group into a trap. Wounded, René taunts Michael that he has no honour and challenges him to defend himself. Michael refuses, and is prepared to die, but is saved by Nikita. We later see Michael watching, from a distance, his sister with her family.
Michael Moments	Stopping Nikita from leaving the briefing table to ask her to describe the man she saw on site with the bomb Michael’s despair at Nikita’s apartment when he tells her about his past In conversation with René, the mind-boggling image of a young Michael delivering toilet paper to striking workers in Paris! The look on his face as René dies, pain, pain, pain
Words of Wisdom	"René, arręte!" "Don’t make me come after you René. If you strike again, I will find you." "I don’t even remember how it started. I was angry at everything, the world around me." "I wanted you to know, in case something happens to me." "I imploded a pseudo alarm. They’ll have discovered it by now but it will give us time to reach a blind spot." "We rode those beat up Lambrettas. We were young, everything seemed good then." "You should’ve let him do it."
Performance Rating	That man Bonniere again, and a second meaty episode in a row for Roy to get his teeth into. We learn more about Michael’s past and how he came to be in Section, Roy being one of the few actors who could possibly make us feel sympathy for a terrorist who had bombed and killed people, before being turned into a calculating killer. He makes us feel the agony of Michael’s conflict between his past and his present, and his acceptance that he may have to die rather than kill his friend. His final scenes with Denis Forest (René) are painful to watch as Roy makes us feel Michael’s pain at the betrayal he knows he has to bring about, severing his final link with his idealist youth.