St. Patrick's Day has always been a source of great inner turmoil to me. I'm half Irish and half WASP, which means war at the best of times. I've also teetered on the brink of a serious drinking problem since birth. So, naturally, a day where everyone and his fuckface brother walks around bellowing about Lucky Charms at the top of his lungs and then drinking four whole beers and throwing up all over the street is going to piss me off. I abhor amateurs when it comes to drinking, which completely aside from the potential health risks turns people into retards unless they have the necessary composure to maintain. It also takes practice and experience to do properly.
But enough about drinking before I start. Today, in honor of St. Patrick driving the snakes out of Ireland (and their subsequent swim across the Atlantic Ocean to become the New York Police Department) we're going to talk about a random assortment of Irish and Irish-related cinema.
The Commitments (1991) dir. Alan Parker
Irish director: No
Irish writer(s): Yes
Irish cast: Yes
Not liking The Commitments is like not liking puppies. You are actually a bad person if you don't like this movie. That's one of the things that can be kind of annoying, periodically, about UK and Irish “proletarians with artistic ambitions” pictures (see also Billy Elliott, The Full Monty, et al). Not that the movies themselves are annoying—they're almost always terrific—but not being allowed to be pissed off pisses me off sometimes. Because even we diluted half-Irish-Americans still have that powerful Irish cranky gene.
Anyway, The Commitments fucking rocks. The protagonist, smooth-talker Jimmy Rabbitte, is on the fringes of the “music business” (i.e. selling Morrissey t-shirts to teenage girls on the subway) and one day decides to assemble a band to play classic soul music. He ropes in a couple of buddies (one of whom, Outspan, would years later get weepy over that cute Czech chick in Once, which I'm not going to be talking about) and puts out an ad in the paper to attract other musicians.
Jimmy: What do you play?
Skeevy dude: Uh, I used to play football at school.
Jimmy: I mean, what instrument?
Skeevy dude: Oh I don't.
Jimmy: What are you doing here, then?
Skeevy dude: Well, I saw everyone lining up, so, uh . . . I thought you were selling drugs.
So, yeah, it's a fairly arduous process. (Note to those who've yet to have the pleasure: auditioning sucks balls no matter which side of the fence you're on) But eventually, Jimmy assembles a group, complete with cute girls to sing backup vocals, an asshole lead vocalist—a must for any proper band—and a trumpet player who claims to know everyone who ever recorded music ever.
The band gets really good. But the trumpet player nails all the backup singers, the lead vocalist so alienates the first drummer that he quits and they have to replace him with their psycho bouncer, and as happens with so many bands, things go bad. But, as the trumpet player—of all people—points out:
“The success of the band was irrelevant - you raised their expectations of life, you lifted their horizons. Sure we could have been famous and made albums and stuff, but that would have been predictable. This way it's poetry.”
While non-Hibernian ears might require a couple viewings—or subtitles—to make sense of the Dublin accents, the whole movie just sings. And holy fuck Colm Meaney is hilarious as Jimmy's Elvis-worshipping dad.
The Quiet Man (1952) dir. John Ford
Irish director: Oh hell yeah
Irish writer: Doesn't really matter, John Ford was in charge
Irish cast: Yes, con molto brio
I haven't spent a whole lot of time sucking John Ford's dick on this blog, since Ford-worship is more the kind of thing my parents' generation indulged in, primarily because they were the last generation for whom Westerns were more than museum pieces. Like, look. I like Westerns. But they're very academic for me. I'll always like the remake of 3:10 to Yuma better than the original because Batman vs. Maximus is always relevant to my interests, which fact has led me to be lectured by People Who Were There that pissing on Glenn Ford like that is out of bounds. Sorry, guys. I'll just never get it on a gut level.
All of which should mean it's hard goddamn work to figure out what's so great about John Ford that his nuts have been lodged in every film critic's nostrils since even before Orson Welles, adopting humility as a pose, credited Stagecoach with teaching him how to direct. (Translation: that's a good 70 years) But it's not. John Ford's pretty awesome. When I was growing up, The Quiet Man was always on TV every St. Patrick's Day, so watching The Quiet Man on March 17th is kinda like watching A Christmas Story on December 25th. And, like A Christmas Story, it's not anything earth-shattering, it's just a really well-made movie that hits the spot as long as you're not feeling too cynical.
But, with all due respect to Peter Billingsley, The Quiet Man has John Wayne. And, with all due respect to my fellow progressives, John Wayne ruled. Six-foot-four, craggy, perpetually pissed off, can kick your ass. And no one, no one, ever looked better on a horse. Here, though, he doesn't ride a whole lot of horses. He plays a former boxer who—after accidentally killing a guy—retires in disgrace, heads to Ireland, takes one good look at Maureen O'Hara, and says, “Bring me that one. The sultry bitch with the fire in her eyes!” (Wait, fuck, that was Elliott Gould in MASH . . .)
So, it's your basic fish out of water culture clash story, but with John Wayne. There's a lot of good natured b'gosh an' begorrah Oyrishness (that during my militant teenage years inspired a lot of angry leftist ranting) and a lot of “all right his reputation is deserved” John Fordness. But, my favorite part of the movie comes at the end, when, as happens in the ways of men, Victor McLaglen and John Wayne have to beat the shit out of each other. It's a great fight scene, filmed by one of the great directors of all time, but my favorite part about the scene is that Victor McLaglen is so awesome that he fights John Wayne to a stalemate. No one does that. It's kind of like watching Jesus walk across a swimming pool and getting the bottom of his robe wet. (Yes, I went there on a Catholic holiday. Deal.)
State of Grace (1990) dir. Phil Joanou
Irish director: No
Irish writer: Yes
Irish cast: Partially
State of Grace is a goddamn mess. It's well made, really well acted, but any time you're forced to go, “ya know, if they cut 45 minutes out of it it woulda been great,” you cannot ascribe perfection. But oh man are there Irish guys in this movie. Not all of them are played by real Irish guys, but with Gary Oldman that's like being in bed with Gina Gershon, Kathryn Bigelow, and Scarlett Johansson and complaining that they're hogging the covers. Sean Penn is good, though a little too “look at me acting” as per usual. Ed Harris is fantastic.
The deal is, Ed Harris runs the Westies, who are on the decline. His brother, Gary Oldman, his enforcer when he's not too drunk to hold a gun, brings Sean Penn into the fold, not knowing that Sean Penn is an undercover cop. So Sean Penn strings along cop handler John Turturro as the Westies get into some shit with Joe Viterelli and the Eye-Ties. Wait, hold up, we need a picture of Joe Viterelli.
Man I miss that fuckin guy. Anyway, before I get sidetracked, shit eventually comes to a head when Ed Harris decides sucking up to Joe Viterelli is more important than his brother's life, so Ed Harris kills Gary Oldman. Only then does Sean Penn really get motivated to take Ed Harris down. There's a great shootout at the end set to "Trip Through Your Wires" by U2 (Phil Joanou also directed Rattle and Hum, which was also too long and about a bunch of full-of-shit Irish guys . . . OMG THEY'RE THE SAME MOVIE!)
State of Grace is one of those movies that's built around showcasing performances. Scenes are constructed more for the actors to Make Choices rather than to move the story forward. Some of those scenes—like the one where Sean Penn and Robin Wright find a so-drunk-he's-practically-tripping Gary Oldman in church, mourning Stevie (a young John C. Reilly), culminating with Gary Oldman mumbling over and over “we're gonna make Stevie a saint,” or the one where Sean Penn and Gary Oldman are trying to figure out when to bust in guns blazing on Joe Viterelli because Ed Harris hasn't called them on the pay phone (remember those? In the remake Ed Harris would have just texted them and boom, no scene) and Sean Penn tells one of the other thugs “No offense, but you're fuckin' retarded”—are good. Some of them are not. Those are the ones I sleep through. Yeah, that's another thing, when you have to take a nap in the middle of a movie, it's too fucking long.
Gangs of New York (2002) dir. Martin Scorsese.
Irish director: Um. No.
Irish writer: No.
Irish cast: No.
Oh, what might have been. I won't dwell, because this movie does suck, and it shouldn't suck, and the fact that it sucks is unfortunate. Because there really hasn't been a great movie about the Irish immigrant experience in this country, and for some reason I thought Marty Scorsese, adapting something like a couple paragraphs of Herbert Asbury's juicy 1928 page-turner, was going to make that great movie. The story goes, he wanted to make this movie forever but could never find a young actor with the necessary gravitas. Which makes it especially awesome that he went into production without a script, and his leading actor was both too old and sucked.
Goddammit this is frustrating. Remember when we all heard about this movie? We heard it was about Irish immigrants engaged in a bloody turf war with American-born gangs, and went “holy shit that sounds awesome.” I went in willing to cut Leonardo DiCaprio miles of slack, but the second he opened his mouth and started talking with that ridiculous fake accent he totally lost me. And he spent the whole movie looking like he needed to take a shit, when I guess he was trying to project inner turmoil.
Daniel Day-Lewis got a lot of attention for his performance as the villain, which, as in Tim Burton's first Batman movie, overwhelmed the ineffectual hero and totally fucked the movie up. Still, when DDL says “What's your name boy? Amsterdam? [pause] I'm New York” that's like yeah. I'm neither able nor willing to resist that line reading. But seriously, this is a movie about the Irish in New York, and the racist American guy is the most memorable thing about it. Eh?
I mean, GODFUCKINGDAMMIT MARTY, you're making a movie that concludes with the fucking Draft Riots? And it still sucks? You're lucky The Departed was good, you inconstant bastard.
Miller's Crossing (1990) dir. Joel Coen (and, let's drop the pretense, Ethan too)
Irish writer/directors: No, but it really doesn't matter.
Irish cast: Extremely
Now, this isn't necessarily a picture about the Irish experience or anything. But it belongs here because the coolest Irish guy who ever breathed real or fictional air is the main character.
Gabriel Byrne has never been better. As Tom Reagan, he pulls off an amazing balancing act, swapping meticulously-crafted Coen Bros dialogue with a variety of underworld types, any one of whom could kill him at any moment. And yet, at the end, he emerges not unscathed but alive, impressive in itself.
Equally badass is fellow Irishman Albert Finney, as political boss Leo, who “runs things.” They're the main two Irish guys, though the guy who describes Albert Finney as “an artist with the Thompson” is cool too. They deal with a bunch of obstreperous Italians, led by the relaxed and sane Jon Polito and his ingratiating, warm colleague Eddie Dane (J.E. Freeman). Wait, hold on, my adjectives got scrambled. Jon Polito is batshit and spends the whole movie so worked up he turns purple, and Eddie Dane is the coldest, scariest motherfucker ever. The only thing in the world that he doesn't have a growled putdown or a couple bullets for is Mink (Steve Buscemi). He's head over heels in love with Mink. Oh, fuck, when Eddie Dane thinks Tom killed Mink it's even scarier than when Ripley realizes the Alien is in the escape pod with her.
But since this is St. Patrick's Day, I'll cease to digress. The scene about which the guy calls Albert Finney an artist with the Thompson. This is what we're talkin' about. Jon Polito sends dudes to Albert Finney's house to kill him. They kill one of Albert Finney's dudes, but the dead guy's cigarette sets something on fire. Albert Finney sees the smoke through the floorboards, and swings into action, killing the two Tommy-gun-toting thugs who burst in upon his inner sanctum. Albert Finney grabs his cigar and one of the Tommy guns then gets his ass outside. He then shoots one remaining assassin about 10,000 times. Then a car with other assassins drives by, firing machine guns at Albert Finney. Albert Finney calmly walks up the street, firing another 20,000 times without reloading, and the car eventually blows up. He then sticks his cigar back in his mouth and surveys his work. Oh, yeah . . . this whole scene, Frank Patterson's recording of “Danny Boy” is playing. This scene, more than any of their others, affirms the Coen brothers' genius to me. My favorite scene in my favorite movie of theirs.
Of course, there are other movies about Ireland, the Irish, and the Irish diaspora. I recommend staying home and watching one of them this evening, while the amateurs are out vomiting on our sidewalks and screaming about how drunk they are after one and a half pints of American seltzerbeer. God, this is an annoying holiday. Valentine's Day you can at least ignore. Instead of going forth and blaspheming against the Emerald Isle by acting like a shithead in a bar, maybe partake of some of the other fine Irish traditions: good conversation, a good book, complaining about not making the World Cup again. Drink at home. Sláinte, y'all.
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