The Violent Enemy (1967) User Reviews

Dull and unrealistic IRA drama

[malcolmgsw · 5/10 · 5 January 2014]

With its limited production values,flat direction and uninspired acting this looks more like an extended piece of TV docu drama.Tom Bell is told at the beginning that he has lost his remission by another prisoner and actually believes him.he is thus goaded into one of the simplest prison breaks ever put on screen.Almost one jump and he's free.He is taken to the Republic of Ireland where he meets the IRA gang that sprung him.There in the pub we meet up with the landlord ,the marvelous Noel Purcell,who is the only reason to continue to watch this film.Bell is cajoled into bombing a local factory in a symbolic move.However he is angry when he finds out that he was lied to about his remission and that if he had waited he would have been released in two months.He has had enough of violence,particularly when he finds out that the gang have committed a robbery.He helps the police to round up the gang.Best watched with the fast forward on.

A whimsical but entertaining thriller

[neil-douglas2010 · 8/10 · 21 June 2023]

Sean Rogan (Tom Bell) escapes from prison in England after hearing his parole is overturned, so they say. He is helped to escape back to Dublin where he is met as a Republican hero. Eight years in jail has changed Sean though and though he agrees in a united Ireland, he wants no part in violence. IRA man Colum O'More (Ed Begley) coerces Sean into working on a plan to bomb an Electronics Company. Also in on the plan are two Englishmen, untrustworthy I think. Inspector O'Sullivan (Phillip O'Flynn) is suspicious of something happening. The 2 Englishmen are interested in only one thing, money, and implicating Sean in the crime.

It's an entertaining piece of whimsy, certainly considering what happened for real in Northern Ireland a couple of years later. In fact at times I was expecting John Wayne and Maureeen O'Hara to enter the pub.