Every once in a while my brain returns to 1998, the first full year I worked as a film critic. What happens is that something will remind me of a movie that has aged particularly well, something like The Big Lebowski or A Simple Plan, and I'll notice that there were quite a lot of good movies that year, and that many of them didn't get much love at the time. But then I'll start thinking about all those movies that did get lots of love -- especially Oscar love -- and how they haven't aged well at all. By looking at the Oscars and the box office list, you'd think it was a terrible movie year, but in reality it was a great movie year. How does this happen? One of the things I ask myself is: why wasn't Jeff Bridges nominated for Best Actor for The Big Lebowski? And come to that,...
- 8/20/2009
- by Jeffrey M. Anderson
- Cinematical
Agnès Merlet's taut, atmospheric, and creepy as all hell looking psychological horror Dorothy Mills is up for pre-order on R1 DVD. The French/Irish co-production the pic has garnered excellent reviews on it’s turn around the festival circuits. With a stunning performance by Jenn Murray in the lead, Dorothy stars Carice van Houten, Gary Lewis, Eamonn Owens, Gavin O'Connor, Niamh Shaw and Charlene McKenna. Synopsis: Dorothy Mills is suspected of assaulting a young baby in a contemporary but timeless rural village...
- 12/4/2008
- 24framespersecond.net
"How could this happen?" has been the incredulous refrain to the recent slaughter of schoolchildren in Jonesboro, Ark., perpetrated by two boys, ages 13 and 11.
Well, here's the answer in Neil Jordan's "The Butcher Boy", a piercing dramatic profile of a cherubic killer. Savagely unsettling, this Warner Bros. release is a mind-bender, a disturbing document that should stir up considerable comment and find interest among sophisticated audiences in select-site venues.
A prickly blend of deadpan humor and bloody mayhem, this insightful depiction of the making of a monster paints its deadly picture with chilling detachment. Framed and punctuated by the sprightly voice-over of a man who as a young teen murdered a neighbor lady, "The Butcher Boy"'s refracted perspective allows us to see the various elements that shape and warp an otherwise "normal" boy to monster proportions.
Based on Patrick McCabe's 1992 novel, Jordan and McCabe have shaped a scenario that is part psychological treatise, part sociological study and part cautionary tale. Fortunately, it has been skinned to the bone of any drivel that may sound academic or come from the dull pipes of the mental health establishment/industry.
Laced with a droll, distanced wit and coiled around a seemingly benign, middle-class household, Jordan has forged a harrowing story of a young boy's descent into monsterdom.
Set in a drab, provincial burg during the early '60s, "The Butcher Boy" is a larkishly toned depiction of small-town regularity. Centered around 12-year-old Francie Brady (Eamonn Owens), a rambunctious chug of a kid who lives in a fantasy world of "Lone Ranger" episodes and adventure stories, Jordan shows how the youngsters escapist world is discolored by events from the "real" world. The countless TV shots of atomic clouds and, most particularly, the doomsday-like fear engendered by the Cuban Missile Crisis serve to shape and distort the boy's apprehensions of life, death and imminent destruction.
With his inner world shaped by TV and bogged down by popular culture, Francie's growth is also stunted by his horrific family life: His father (Stephen Rea) is a besotted lout who has boozed his way out of a promising musical career, and his mother is as nutty as the fruitcakes she compulsively bakes. Not surprisingly, Francie has no empathy for others and feels no remorse or compassion for his increasingly cruel boyhood deeds.
Thematically, Jordan and McCabe's screenplay is a perceptive balancing act in its visualization of Francie's increasingly fractured psychology. It methodically shows the "Lord of the Flies"-like cruelty that can fester within kid culture. Accordingly, viewers will likely not only find the film disquieting but a challenge to their sensibilities as well. Its rhythms and tones often run counterpoint to the surface narrative; in short, Jordan keeps us off balance and unsure how to view things, which ultimately shapes our eye to seeing below the surface of what appears to be mundane, everyday reality and "normal" behavior.
The performances are spare and revealing. As the monster-child, Owens brings a fresh-faced aura to his manic murdering. As the character unravels, we see clearly how his chirpy playfulness descends to cold-blooded mania. It's a fleshy, full performance, one that makes us coil and squirm. As Francie's loutish father, Rea clues us to the squandered promise that runs in this family's bloodlines, while Fiona Shaw rings true as a busybody shrew.
Technical contributions are a marvelous, complex mix, highlighted by composer Elliot Goldenthal's frothily eerie score and cinematographer Adrian Biddle's lethal-scoped framings.
THE BUTCHER BOY
Warner Bros.
Geffen Pictures presents
Producers: Redmond Morris, Stephen Woolley
Director: Neil Jordan
Screenwriters: Neil Jordan, Patrick McCabe
Based on the novel by: Patrick McCabe
Executive producer: Neil Jordan
Director of photography: Adrian Biddle
Production designer: Anthony Pratt
Editor: Tony Lawson
Music: Elliot Goldenthal
Costume designer: Sandy Powell
Casting: Susie Figgis
Art director: Anna Rackard
Special effects supervisor: Joss Williams
Color/stereo
Cast:
Francie Brady: Eamonn Owens
Benny Brady: Stephen Rea
Joe: Alan Boyle
Mrs. Nugent: Fiona Shaw
Mrs. Brady: Aisling O'Sullivan
Virgin Mary: Sinead O'Connor
Running time - 120 minutes
MPAA rating: R...
Well, here's the answer in Neil Jordan's "The Butcher Boy", a piercing dramatic profile of a cherubic killer. Savagely unsettling, this Warner Bros. release is a mind-bender, a disturbing document that should stir up considerable comment and find interest among sophisticated audiences in select-site venues.
A prickly blend of deadpan humor and bloody mayhem, this insightful depiction of the making of a monster paints its deadly picture with chilling detachment. Framed and punctuated by the sprightly voice-over of a man who as a young teen murdered a neighbor lady, "The Butcher Boy"'s refracted perspective allows us to see the various elements that shape and warp an otherwise "normal" boy to monster proportions.
Based on Patrick McCabe's 1992 novel, Jordan and McCabe have shaped a scenario that is part psychological treatise, part sociological study and part cautionary tale. Fortunately, it has been skinned to the bone of any drivel that may sound academic or come from the dull pipes of the mental health establishment/industry.
Laced with a droll, distanced wit and coiled around a seemingly benign, middle-class household, Jordan has forged a harrowing story of a young boy's descent into monsterdom.
Set in a drab, provincial burg during the early '60s, "The Butcher Boy" is a larkishly toned depiction of small-town regularity. Centered around 12-year-old Francie Brady (Eamonn Owens), a rambunctious chug of a kid who lives in a fantasy world of "Lone Ranger" episodes and adventure stories, Jordan shows how the youngsters escapist world is discolored by events from the "real" world. The countless TV shots of atomic clouds and, most particularly, the doomsday-like fear engendered by the Cuban Missile Crisis serve to shape and distort the boy's apprehensions of life, death and imminent destruction.
With his inner world shaped by TV and bogged down by popular culture, Francie's growth is also stunted by his horrific family life: His father (Stephen Rea) is a besotted lout who has boozed his way out of a promising musical career, and his mother is as nutty as the fruitcakes she compulsively bakes. Not surprisingly, Francie has no empathy for others and feels no remorse or compassion for his increasingly cruel boyhood deeds.
Thematically, Jordan and McCabe's screenplay is a perceptive balancing act in its visualization of Francie's increasingly fractured psychology. It methodically shows the "Lord of the Flies"-like cruelty that can fester within kid culture. Accordingly, viewers will likely not only find the film disquieting but a challenge to their sensibilities as well. Its rhythms and tones often run counterpoint to the surface narrative; in short, Jordan keeps us off balance and unsure how to view things, which ultimately shapes our eye to seeing below the surface of what appears to be mundane, everyday reality and "normal" behavior.
The performances are spare and revealing. As the monster-child, Owens brings a fresh-faced aura to his manic murdering. As the character unravels, we see clearly how his chirpy playfulness descends to cold-blooded mania. It's a fleshy, full performance, one that makes us coil and squirm. As Francie's loutish father, Rea clues us to the squandered promise that runs in this family's bloodlines, while Fiona Shaw rings true as a busybody shrew.
Technical contributions are a marvelous, complex mix, highlighted by composer Elliot Goldenthal's frothily eerie score and cinematographer Adrian Biddle's lethal-scoped framings.
THE BUTCHER BOY
Warner Bros.
Geffen Pictures presents
Producers: Redmond Morris, Stephen Woolley
Director: Neil Jordan
Screenwriters: Neil Jordan, Patrick McCabe
Based on the novel by: Patrick McCabe
Executive producer: Neil Jordan
Director of photography: Adrian Biddle
Production designer: Anthony Pratt
Editor: Tony Lawson
Music: Elliot Goldenthal
Costume designer: Sandy Powell
Casting: Susie Figgis
Art director: Anna Rackard
Special effects supervisor: Joss Williams
Color/stereo
Cast:
Francie Brady: Eamonn Owens
Benny Brady: Stephen Rea
Joe: Alan Boyle
Mrs. Nugent: Fiona Shaw
Mrs. Brady: Aisling O'Sullivan
Virgin Mary: Sinead O'Connor
Running time - 120 minutes
MPAA rating: R...
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