Michael Collins

 

Michael Collins 1996

• Director: Neal Jordan
• Seen by this director: Breakfast on Pluto, The Butcher Boy, Interview with the Vampire, The Crying Game, Mona Lisa
• Based on book: no
• Cast: Liam Neeson, Aidan Quinn, Julia Roberts, Ian Hart, Alan Rickman, Stephen Rea
• Personal “oh yeah him/her” reaction, i.e. have seen this actor in:
• Liam Neeson - The Dark Knight Rises, Widows, Life’s Too Short, Seraphim Falls, Batman Begins, Kingdome of Heaven, Love Actually, Gangs of New York, Star Wars, Les Misérables, Michael Collins, Rob Roy, Nell, Schindler’s List, Ruby Cairo, Excalibur
• Aidan Quinn – Elle s’appellait Sarah, Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee, The Exonerated, Music of the Heart, Practical Magic, Looking for Richard, Frankenstein, The Handmaid’s Tale, Desperately Seeking Susan, Benny & Joon
• Julia Roberts – August Osage County, Fireflies in the Garden, Closer, Moan Lisa’s Smile, Full Frontal, Erin Brockovich, Runaway Bride, Notting Hill, Mary Reilly, The Pelican Brief, Sleeping with the Enemy, Pretty Woman, Steel Magnolias
• Ian Hart – Breakfast on Pluto, Tristram Shandy, Finding Neverland, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, Born Romantic, Longitude, The Butcher Boy, The Englishman Who Went Up a Hill and Came Down a Mountain
• Alan Rickman – Eye in the Sky, The Butler, Snow Cake, Harry Potter, Sweeney Todd, Alice in Wonderland, Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, Love Actually, Galaxy Quest, Dogma, Sense and Sensibility, Robin Hood, The January Man, Die Hard, Romeo and Juliet.
• Stephen Rea - Utopia, V for Vendetta, Tara Road, Breakfast on Pluto, Till Crazy, Butcher Boy, Fever Pitch, Interview with the Vampire, The Crying Game
•  Why?  The subject.
• Seen:  21 May 2023 

The Irish Republic. The IRA.  1916 and onwards. The heroes and villains. Michael Collins (Neeson) is supposedly the hero here.

With the subject and a cast like this the film should be brilliant. Some find it so. Others are disturbed by its historical inaccuracy. My main objection is that it’s mostly a cloak and daggers melodrama with a lot of shooting and an unnecessary love story. At times it borders on the farcical. It does little, if anything, to clarify the conflict. And – the cardinal sin – it’s boring.

 

2 * of 5