Tag: IRA

Screening Room: ‘Bobby Sands: 66 Days’

On By chrisbarsantiIn Film - New, Film-DocumentaryLeave a comment

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Bobby Sands: 66 Days is a sharp new documentary about the IRA hero’s world-gripping 1981 hunger strike and how it encapsulated the feverish passions of the Protestant-Catholic “Troubles.”

It’s playing now in limited release. My review is at Film Journal International:

Northern Ireland was still convulsing after years of strife. As Byrne’s dense weave of televisual archive footage shows, the form of battle ranged from peaceful marches to assassinations and running street skirmishes pitting gangs of rock- and Molotov cocktail-armed Catholic youth against British soldiers and a primarily Protestant police force. But for a few details, the footage of a city in free-fall could have been shot anywhere from Berlin circa 1945 to Aleppo today: children playing in burnt-out cars and rubble-strewn fields, the few standing walls covered in political graffiti…

Here’s the trailer:

Writer’s Corner: Dublin Writers Festival, From Festivals to The Troubles

On By chrisbarsantiIn Books, OmniculturalLeave a comment

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yearoffestivals1In the last bit of coverage from the Dublin Writers Festival, we have a story from Ireland’s fraught past and cautiously optimistic future.

First there was a marvelous spoken-word show from Mark Graham, who had decided not long before to buy a used camper and go attend three festivals a week around Ireland for an entire year. Apparently every town of more than two houses has a festival, so it worked.

Next up was “Where They Lie,” an investigation into the search for justice on the part of those who were “disappeared” by the IRA during The Troubles (that horrid euphemism) in the north for supposedly collaborating with the British or Unionists. It was a tough evening, with no easy answers for those in attendance.

“Where the Disappeared Lie” is here at PopMatters.

New in Theaters: ‘Shadow Dancer’

On By chrisbarsantiIn Film - NewLeave a comment
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Clive Owen as an MI6 agent trying to use an IRA operative to spy on her own family in ‘Shadow Dancer’

shadow-dancer-posterClive Owen continues to frustrate with his choosing of roles in films that no amount of his innate greatness can save. Case in point is the glum Shadow Dancer, which opened yesterday in limited release. Though it boasts Owen, a solid supporting cast, nail-biter premise, and crackerjack director (of documentaries, at least) James Marsh, the film barely registers a heartbeat.

My full review ran at Film Racket, here’s part of it:

The pregnant pause is one of the more useful items in a director’s toolbox for heightening drama and tension. One can’t have just nonstop chatter and explosions, after all, no matter what the oeuvre of Michael Bay might argue to the contrary. But like any tool, it can be overused. Case in point: Shadow Dancer, a smartly cast but drearily inactive IRA thriller that tries to be all pregnant pause. This constant sidestepping manner means that by the time the credits roll, viewers understand as little about the characters on screen, and the morality of their actions, as they did when the film began…

You can watch the trailer here: