Eye opener

Rating: Null/10 (10 June 2007)

Saw this film last nite at a second-run/art house theater. Knew practically nothing of it beforehand. Amazing that one reader believed the film would not be released in the UK. The film did spur me to read more about Irish-Anglo history, and I would like other readers' input. Seems that Damien is a stand-in for Eamon de Valera (deft touch that his girlfriend was named Sinead). Was Teddy a fictionalization of Michael Collins or Arthur Griffith? I noticed a reader's challenge that Americans would view the republican cause through the prism of today's IRA. Quite the opposite for me. I did not equate the formative years of the IRA as depicted in the film as representative of modern-day versions. However, before this film I did not know how much socialist or communist influence there was in Sinn Fein's (and by extension the IRA's) philosophy at the time. I don't think those ideals have retained their currency in the modern incarnations. Despite my distaste and disdain for brutality on either side of the issue, I can appreciate the desire for independence and self-determination, and in light of the centuries of brutal repression, from Henry VIII and Cromwell's Puritans on down, this film has engendered more sympathy in me for the republican cause, if not for the modern IRA's armed struggle.