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Leaving Ireland in hopes of starting anew in America after the tragic loss of their two-year old son, Johnny (Paddy Considine) and Sarah (Samantha Morton) move their young daughters, Christy and Ariel (real-life sisters Sarah and Emma Bolger) to a slum apartment in New York. I don’t know if post-9/11 NY is the best place for kicking up your spirits, but the film’s time period is already a bit confused. If it IS supposed to be the early 80s as some have suggested, then what’s with the modern montage of Times Square with the Jessica Alba billboard? Don’t forget,E.T. WAS in theaters in 2002. I just call ‘em like I see ‘em, and I digress.

Daddy’s a struggling actor. Mom will get a job in an ice cream parlor. They may not have much money, but thankfully live amongst the nicest transvestites and drug addicts in the Big Apple. The eldest Christy narrates their plight for us and documents everything with her hand-held camera as Dad does whatever he can to make the transition easier. He certainly loves his daughters but with his emotional switches on permanent hold, method acting is quite the stretch. In the land of theatre, it’s somewhat perplexing that the only auditions he can find are for Shakespearean productions. Of course, it’s more of a metaphorical gesture (like inspiring your family with E.T.) than realism.

In America exists on that plane though, in-between the harshness of reality and outright miracles where if you help the homeless, they’ll reward you with food stamps. Downstairs from them lives the hulking, tortured artist Mateo (Djimon Hounsou) who yells and crashes through his apartment until he lays eyes on the little girls and his gentle humanity comes to the forefront. Hounsou is great in the role even if it’s another noble minority with something to teach us all. Of course we’d never have learned anything if mommy and daddy hadn’t sent their two children through the rundown building alone to trick-and-treat and knock on stranger’s doors.

This behavior is a recurring irresponsibility that clouds up the film’s good intentions. We never doubt Johnny and Sarah’s love for their children and it’s nice to not again have to spend time with a pair of worry warts for a change, but consider the following actions.

Other than the most potentially disasterous Halloween evening since the new Shamrock masks from Season of the Witch, mom and dad also send Christy and Ariel off alone in a late thunderstorm for ice cream so they can have sex. Sarah gets herself pregnant, piling on the bills, despite doctors telling her that its counterproductive to her health. All this on top of already losing one child thanks to lack of keeping an eye.

Director Jim Sheridan, in a semi-autobiographical tale, somehow manages to pull us back in through moments so touching that it leaves you wondering “how the hell did THAT happen to me?” One particular scene involving a parlor game to appease his child cultivates both how careless Johnny is and how far he is willing to go for her happiness. I defy anyone to name a more gut-wrenching moment this year. All the rash decisions and clueless behavior on the part of the parents combined with the fantasyland of its resolutions (Mateo’s final action is a convenient doozy) somehow manage to disappear in a moment of perfect clarity that blindsides us much the same way it does Johnny. I didn’t know how I entirely felt about the film before this point and I found myself on the verge of waterworks.

Earlier this year I wrote how the Irish love a good martyr (see: Veronica Guerin) and that the actions of one can be emphasized into a grand gesture that overcomes the surrounding events. Maybe it’s unfair to criticize parental actions in a film that aspires for a Capra-esque universe albeit one that uses reality as some kind of transparent wallpaper. There’s a hokeyness that’s hard to escape yet one that creates an emotional current that in the end is impossible to ignore. It’s poignant finale is thanks in large part to the amazing work of Sarah Bolger, giving one of the best child performances ever in a year already filled with such striking turns from Keisha Castle-Hughes (Whale Rider) and Jenna Boyd (The Missing). Somewhere, parents are doing their job. Now if we can just keep them from sending their kids to Cat in the Hat and to more movies like this.

link directly to this review at https://www.efilmcritic.com/review.php?movie=6812&reviewer=198
originally posted: 11/26/03 17:02:29
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