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The Wind That Shakes The Barley (2006, Ken Loach)
4.5/5
Ken does it again...
I thought it would be hard for the director to top his Spanish Civil War tale, Land And Freedom, for sheer guts, pathos and emotion but he has.
The Wind That Shakes The Barley tells of the early stages of that almost forgotten conflict, not least in my own country, the Irish Civil War. In true Loachian style, our Ken takes a side (no prizes for guessing that it's the side of The Working Man) and sticks with it, warts and all.
It's an extremely partial viewpoint with none of the pandering to Hollywood convention of Neil Jordan's Michael Collins, which covers much of the same, bittersweet ground. British soldiers are portrayed as animalistic killing machines to a man and Republican volunteers as idealistic freedom fighters - a point of debate, for sure, but the history books note that the Cork of 1920 was a savage, strife-torn place and the atrocities by Crown forces (a mixture of hardened veterans of the 14-18 War and boys fresh from school) have passed into a particularly gory legend.
I never thought I'd say this but Cillian Murphy is superb as the quiet, intelligent young doctor drawn to arms against the occupying forces and, later, his own countrymen (and brother). Liam Cunningham, too, gives a gritty and heartfelt performance as Dan, another anti-Treaty volunteer.
Loach has striven for naturalism his entire career - ad-hoc performances given to cameras positioned as far from the action as possible (with a very long lens, of course, so kudos to Barry Ackroyd's cinematography) with the director often hiding himself and his crew from the actors' view so that they're totally 'in the moment'.
The style works here just as effectively as in Ken's smaller scale dramas.
On the basis of a single viewing I'd have to say that The Wind That Shakes The Barley is the best film I've seen this year by a street, and the most powerful in many a year...
4.5/5
Ken does it again...
I thought it would be hard for the director to top his Spanish Civil War tale, Land And Freedom, for sheer guts, pathos and emotion but he has.
The Wind That Shakes The Barley tells of the early stages of that almost forgotten conflict, not least in my own country, the Irish Civil War. In true Loachian style, our Ken takes a side (no prizes for guessing that it's the side of The Working Man) and sticks with it, warts and all.
It's an extremely partial viewpoint with none of the pandering to Hollywood convention of Neil Jordan's Michael Collins, which covers much of the same, bittersweet ground. British soldiers are portrayed as animalistic killing machines to a man and Republican volunteers as idealistic freedom fighters - a point of debate, for sure, but the history books note that the Cork of 1920 was a savage, strife-torn place and the atrocities by Crown forces (a mixture of hardened veterans of the 14-18 War and boys fresh from school) have passed into a particularly gory legend.
I never thought I'd say this but Cillian Murphy is superb as the quiet, intelligent young doctor drawn to arms against the occupying forces and, later, his own countrymen (and brother). Liam Cunningham, too, gives a gritty and heartfelt performance as Dan, another anti-Treaty volunteer.
Loach has striven for naturalism his entire career - ad-hoc performances given to cameras positioned as far from the action as possible (with a very long lens, of course, so kudos to Barry Ackroyd's cinematography) with the director often hiding himself and his crew from the actors' view so that they're totally 'in the moment'.
The style works here just as effectively as in Ken's smaller scale dramas.
On the basis of a single viewing I'd have to say that The Wind That Shakes The Barley is the best film I've seen this year by a street, and the most powerful in many a year...