It's one shoot that's killing everyone

Mariane, I'm sorry ... I didn't bring your Danny home."

With these words and tears in his eyes, a Pakistani police investigator tells Mariane Pearl that her husband, Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl, is dead. The lines are from A Mighty Heart: the Brave Life and Death of My Husband, Daniel Pearl, a harrowing account of Pearl's murder by Al Qaida militants in 2002.

Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie started filming the screen version of A Mighty Heart in Karachi, Pakistan in July, with Pitt as co-producer and Jolie cast as Mrs Pearl.

The celebrity couple is hoping their film, to be released in 2007, can heal wounds. But, already, the movie is becoming part of the controversy it seeks to depict, some observers say.

Daniel Pearl's murder, although nearly five years old, is hardly solved. The most recent stir erupted in September, when Pakistan's President General Pervez Musharraf revealed for the first time in his memoir, In the Line of Fire, that Khalid Shaikh Mohammad (identified by the US 9/11 Commission Report as the mastermind of the September 11 attacks) either killed Pearl or played a leading role in the planning of his murder.

Musharraf says Shaikh Mohammad confessed under Pakistani interrogation. Mohammad is currently being held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and has never been tried in connection with Pearl's murder.

Prior to Musharraf's book, none of Pearl's murderers have been publicly identified. Ahmad Omar Saeed Shaikh has been convicted and sentenced to death for kidnapping with the intent to murder Pearl. But he has always insisted he was not present at Pearl's killing.

Lawyers in Pakistan say that Musharraf's revelation - suggested by Pakistani sources but never before confirmed - casts doubt on who killed Pearl and what role Shaikh might have played beyond the kidnapping.

"I'm going to submit an application that the [Musharraf's] book be used as a piece of evidence. The head of state has exonerated them," says Rai Bashir, a Lahore-based lawyer who represents Shaikh and two of his accomplices.

Scapegoat?

Was Shaikh a convenient scapegoat or deeply involved? How the movie treats this new development in the case could shape public perceptions and the outcome of his appeal.

Musharraf raises other intriguing questions by suggesting that Shaikh was recruited by MI-6, the British intelligence agency, while he was attending college in Britain. Some Western journalists who have investigated the case have asserted that Shaikh was a member both of the Al Qaida and of Pakistan's intelligence wing.

The filmmakers wouldn't comment on the storyline. A statement released by Jolie says, "This is not a film about terrorism or conflict, it is a story of people of all faiths working together to find the truth."

Setback

This summer, the moviemakers suffered a setback when the Pakistani federal government shut down preliminary filming in Karachi, citing a lack of permission. Representatives of Paramount Vantage, which is distributing the film, insist they obtained proper documentation to shoot the film.

Displaying the same determination as Pearl's wife, and Pearl himself, the film hardly skipped a beat, however, and changed locations to Pune, India.

But moving the shoot to India hasn't stopped the controversy in Pakistan.

Pearl's kidnappers, including Shaikh, are now in jail. Their lawyers say the film, once released, could severely damage an appeal they have pending.

"[The movie] will prejudice the minds of the judge and jury. This amounts to interfering with the process of the law," says Abdul Waheed Katpar, a lawyer in Karachi who represented Shaikh throughout his trial.

Even some of those who played a central role in hunting for Pearl are not without their misgivings.

Mir Zubair Mahmoud, the Karachi policeman who headed the Pearl investigation, is known as "Captain" in The Mighty Heart. He risked his life and reputation.

On the one hand, the current attention makes Mahmoud proud. But five years later, he still has concerns about how the film will be received in Pakistan. "I did something good and have recognition for that. But ... there are so many who don't like me, who think I'm a traitor - because I arrested one of their good friends."

Jameel Yousuf, who also played a central role in the investigation, says police received death threats from Al Qaida-linked terrorists long after Pearl was killed. "We gave our moral support to Mariane. I hope they show that part."