It’s set in 1969. The family (husband played by Jamie Dornam; long-suffering wife by Caitríona Balfe; and their two sons – played by Lewis McAskie and Jude Hill) lives in a mainly Protestant area of north Belfast, alongside a few Catholic families (and in relative harmony).
But violence explodes when unionist hardmen burn the Catholics out of their homes and set up barricades to protect their new neighbourhood against republican retaliation and the film represents a salient reminder of those awful times – all in the ‘name of religion’(!).
At times, it all makes for difficult viewing but, thankfully, the despair of the Northern Irish situation is far outweighed by pragmatism and humour of the ‘ordinary’ people.
At times, despite the painful references to the ‘Troubles’, it perhaps felt a little too ‘sugar-coated’ or sentimental – helped by the wonderful Van Morrison on the soundtrack (Van Morrison, of course, was the ONLY appropriate music to accompany the film!) – but the mix worked very well for me.
I think my only criticism was the difficulty, at times, in understanding what was being said – not because I couldn’t hear, but because I couldn’t make out what people were saying. Some of this was undoubtedly due to my failure to catch the Northern Irish accent. Sadly, I’ve become so used to watching the telly with sub-titles these days that I really missed them!
I went to the cinema thinking this film might not be for me… but I was completely wrong. I thought it was rather special.
PS: My second film of the year at the Watershed (and also my second black+white film) and I’m delighted to report that, once again, EVERY member of the audience wore a face-mask!
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