I BEGAN this review by describing Jack O'Connell as THE rising star of British cinema, before realising that, after witnessing his latest accomplished performance, his stock has already bubbled over.

In Belfast-set military thriller 71, O'Connell plays a young soldier lost in the mayhem of the Troubles-torn capital, separated from his unit and hunted by murderous Provisional IRA gunmen.

As recent recruit Private Gary Hook, his uniform as green as his experience, he has been sent along with the rest of his ill-prepared Army unit as an emergency response to the bloody conflict.

When assisting a vicious house raid by the RUC on the nationalist Falls Road, a riot ignites, soldiers driven back by a barrage of bricks and vitriol, with Hook left on the wrong side of a wall of protestors.

The enthralling set piece results in a savage mob-handed beating for the Derby lad he somehow manages to escape, fleeing into a maze of crumbling houses and burning cars.

1971 is the year internment was brought back into Northern Ireland, but 71 does not seek to score political points, or ask the audience to take sides.

At once, everyone is going for the jugular, whether that be Original IRA vs Provisional IRA, the Army's undercover operatives vs over-matched junior officers, or nationalists vs loyalists.

Battle lines are drawn on both sides, the overriding reaction a compelling sense squaddies like Hook, desperately young and naive, were hopelessly inadequate in attempting to quell the maelstrom.

That is reinforced by our view through the eyes of Cook, muscular and almost mute.

His vulnerability echoes as he waits for night to fall behind enemy lines, or in a later conversation about David Bowie as he lies bleeding in bed.

A chance meeting with a child loyalist footsoldier, a stark reminder of the generational nature of the Troubles with hatred passed from father to son, sees Cook asked if he is Protestant or Catholic.

His reply of 'I don't know' encompasses Cook's dilemma, buried in a conflict he doesn't understand, running from hunters of whom he cannot fathom their hate.

When night falls anxiety rises, gloomy, dank streets lit by murky streetlights, alien to Cook and also, in a way, alien to the viewer.

While 71 was shot in Sheffield, Liverpool and Blackburn, the fictional landscape created is at once familiar and post-apocalyptic, a wasteland that could be envisaged in a dying dystopian world of the future.

Known for gritty TV drama Top Boy, Yann Demange directs in his first big screen feature, with emphasis placed skilfully on the plight of Cook's perilous position.

As alliance and betrayal meet in a climatic gun battle, perhaps the only part of the film that feels overdone, his fate hangs in the balance.

O'Connell delivers his usual brilliance, a toughness honed in prison drama Starred Up accentuated by the vulnerability that draws empathy.

In the end, any loyalty you're asked to fine amid the complex backdrop is only with him.