"Seeing the fire and all the young people screaming and trying to get out was just too much, " said Elizabeth Buckley, mother of 23-year-old Jimmy Buckley who perished in the Valentine's Day blaze. "I can't go back in and watch more of that."

"The film portrayed exactly what happened that night and it was very very real, " said John O'Meara, who recalled waiting outside the Stardust for his brother Brendan (23) to come out. Brendan was found in Jervis Street hospital but he died 11 days later, the 46th victim of the tragedy. "It brought back memories and that was hard."

From 11 o'clock in the morning, the relatives arrived at the Clontarf Castle Hotel for the screening of the drama, Stardust. Most of them were elderly couples, whose children would be middle-aged now had they survived. Others were siblings, nieces, nephews and cousins of the deceased. They were tense and unwilling to talk. "We'll tell you what we think after, " said one.

The drama follows the story of five young people involved in the tragedy: Mary and Martina Keegan, Liam Dunne, Jimmy Buckley and Barbara Fitzsimons. RTE laid on counsellors to comfort the relatives as they watched a reconstruction of the fire that swept in minutes through the club filled with 800 revellers. Padlocks and chains and hung on at least one emergency exit that night, trapping people inside.

"When it got to the part where you could see the kids' blackened hands at the doors, it was just horrible, " said Gertrude Barrett, whose son Michael died that night. "A lot of people got up and left then.

It was just too real for us to cope with."

A brother of Brian Hobbs, who also died that night, was incensed at the production. "We don't need a drama, we need a documentary, " he said, "48 kids died that night. We had no money to bury our kids, we just had to get on with it and they put on a show. We don't need a show, we need the truth."

Elizabeth Buckley's hands shook as she recalled how her son Jimmy was only identifiable by a piece of his shirt and his wedding ring. "He was stuck to the floor with the heat, they told me, " she said. "They never had a chance."

Others were angry that they hadn't been involved in the discussion process with RTE.

"I'm disappointed that it focused on four families and no one else, " said O'Meara. "There were 44 families there that weren't represented. My mother has never moved from her house in Coolock but we were never approached."

"How would they know anything about me and my son?"

demanded Barrett. "They never came near me for documentation, they never read the tribunal records. I'm glad this will get the attention of the public, but they're not going to get justice for my son.

That's my mission."

Many relatives declined to attend the viewing. Antoinette Keegan, whose sisters Mary and Martina died in the blaze, said she was not attending because "it would be too upsetting". "I'll tape it and watch it in my own time when I'm ready, " she said.

Her mother Christine said she welcomed the drama, but she too would not be attending the screening. "I was there that night, " she said. "I stood outside that disco and watched the flames. I heard the screaming and I watched the firemen lay out the bodies. I don't need to go and watch it on a television screen because the memories of that night will never leave me."