Identity crisis

Illuminating divided Ireland

by Nicholas Patterson

"SPLIT/SCREEN: DIVIDED IDENTITIES IN IRISH FILM AND TELEVISION," At the Harvard Film Archive April 9 through 18.

Peter Flynn and Jim Lane, the Emerson College professors who are curating the Harvard Film Archive's "Split/Screen: Divided Identities in Irish Film and Television," have assembled an impressive group of more than 25 feature films, documentaries, and shorts that explore both Irish social and political issues -- Catholic/Protestant violence, the legacy of the civil war, the roles of women in Northern Ireland, and the fate of the Irish language -- and the history and future of Irish filmmaking. Fleshing out the series are introductions to a number of the films (Professor Robert Savage of the Boston College Irish Studies Program will do a presentation on "Irish Language Film and Television" on April 10), an evening with director Cathal Black on April 16, and a panel discussion on the history and current state of Irish filmmaking -- "Reflections/Projections in Irish Cinema" -- on April 17 with panelists including Kevin Rockett of University College Dublin and Jeffrey Chown of Northern Illinois University.

A fine introduction to and overview is provided in Irish Cinema: Ourselves Alone? (1997; April 17 at 2 p.m.), which traces the development of Irish filmmaking over the last century. Combining footage and interviews with big-name Irish directors (Jim Sheridan, Neil Jordan) and writers (Roddy Doyle) and lesser-known filmmakers (Margo Harkin, Cathal Black), this documentary examines the mixed blessing of mid-century American and British film productions in Ireland, which brought in money but usually offered only low-level jobs for the Irish and portrayed them as stereotypical caricatures: sentimental, irrational, and given to singing, dancing, and drinking (The Quiet Man, anyone?). Ourselves Alone? points to Sheridan's My Left Foot (1989), which won two Oscars, as the film that put Irish filmmaking on the international map and led to an influx of money and interest in Irish films from the outside world. This new international interest, the filmmakers caution, has made it increasingly difficult for directors to "keep it real" and remain faithful to the country and its problems. Neil Jordan, the most eloquent and thoughtful interviewee, argues that there is pressure to Hollywood-ize Irish stories to make them more palatable to non-Irish audiences.

Keeping it real is a hallmark of Korea (1995; April 16 at 7 p.m., with director Cathal Black in attendance), which explores the legacy of the civil war in rural Ireland in the 1950s. A feud between two men -- John Doyle, who had opposed the partition, and Ben Moran, who had supported it -- provides a microcosm of the bitter enmities that tore apart the Irish population following the civil war. It takes a Romeo and Juliet turn as Doyle's son, home from university and waiting for his exam results, falls in love with Moran's daughter. The elder Doyle is so obsessed with what he perceives as Moran's betrayal of Ireland that upon learning of the affair he pushes his son to emigrate to America and join the military, even though he might never see the boy again. Black presents an unflinching view of the human cost of holding on to old grudges while holding out hope for future reconciliation.

That future is now in Divorcing Jack (1998; April 9 at 7 p.m.), which won the Critics' Prize last year at Cannes and is the series's most offbeat and entertaining film. Northern journalist Dan Starkey (David Thewlis, the star of Mike Leigh's Naked) is a hard-drinking, satirical political columnist who after a drunken one-night stand finds himself up to his knees in shite: his wife leaves him, his lover (who happens to be the daughter of a top politician and the girlfriend of an IRA killer) is murdered, and he mistakenly kills his lover's mother. Soon he's running from the police, Protestant militia men, and the IRA while trying to recover a tape that could end the career of a prominent politician. Divorcing Jack maps out the tangled and violent rivalries of the modern Northern Irish political landscape with bizarre situations and characters (i.e., a gun-toting nun) and witty dialogue like this: Boston Globe reporter: "How do you know they were Protestant militiamen?" Starkey: "He had F.T.P. tattoo'd on his forehead: `Fuck the pope.' "