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source: Fifty Dead Men Walking

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source: Fifty Dead Men Walking

Fifty Dead Men Walking is a big and wonderful movie about a bunch of Irish people who are being terrorized by the Brits. They decide to fight fire with fire for their freedom. On the one hand you have the IRA blowing people up with bombs and torturing people ala Reservoir Dogs, but on the other hand you have the invading British force in riot gear randomly abusing any Irish Catholic who jay walks or looks cross-eyed, ala Abu Ghraib. This isn't Braveheart; it's more like Spy Game or dare I say the actual invasion of Iraq. There is no innocent side in this gritty story, any well-defined good or evil, just the truth about a war. However, this film goes beyond The Crying Game or In The Name Of The Father to present something that is more in the tradition of great gangster films such as The Departed (aka, Infernal Affair) or Blow or Donnie Brasco or even Good Fellas, or great cable dramas such as Brotherhood; it is as cinematic as Scarface or The Good Shepard, with elements from the older classics such as Seven Ups or French Connection spicing it up. This epic masterpiece is full of subtleties, such as when the guy looks under the van for explosives before entering or how the conversation about pregnancy is done completely under the covers. Ben Kingsley is in rare form. We just have to wonder why works of art such as this don't show up in our neighborhood theaters in place of the trash we are spoon-fed. What an absolutely wonderful movie. The direction reminds us of the best works of Clint Eastwood crossed with the frantic energy of The Bourne Identity. I realize the title of this movie was taken from the book, but it sounds like a zombie parody of Dead Man Walking, which is why I nearly skipped this flick. I'm glad I gave it a chance. May I recommend the titles Undercover or Covert or -- The Dirty Work -- or some other catchy name like that instead? I mean, they put too much work into this classic to lose their American audience simply because of its crappy title. Also, some subtitles to help with the thick accents would work to everyone's advantage. Words just can't describe how great this movie is: see it.

Amazingly I'm going to struggle to fill the ten-line minimum on this one. None of the art of Hunger. More of the harsh realities of 80s Belfast but demonstrated mostly by crap cars, coarse armour plating, and even coarser police and army foot soldiers. And this is where it went wrong for me. No real character depth in the middle of extraordinary times. This was an OK gangster film which gets an extra point for its location. (I saw this film in the middle of fabulous modern day Belfast.) Ron (Viewed 21Apr09)

Take one young naïve man and place him as an informer (a "Tout") on the IRA to Special Investigations/Police and you have the gist of this film. Set in Belfast, we follow the life of one guy who is in over his head (as they always are) and has to juggle both sides along with his burgeoning family commitments (girlfriend with kid etc). A generally captivating storyline being based on a true story, and to my surprise didn't glorify any act of violence but rather shows life as a ground patrol man for the IRA in it's most gritty form. Tries to steer clear of cliché and does a fine job. Acting is fair and most actors fill in their roles very comfortable. Ben Kingsley is wonderful as the Special Investigators sponsor, whilst Jim Sturgess as the informer keeps you on side throughout the film. Rose McGowan as an IRA intelligence officer is the only person who seems out of place but likely was there to add a bit more colour to the surroundings but doesn't take away from the film too much. Overall, an enjoyable analysis of life in the IRA. Add in a good soundtrack and some able camera work and you have in total a very good film. Good viewing.

Fifty Dead Men Walking milks every stereotype, repeats every newsreel image of "the troubles" we've ever seen, grafts in a miscast Ben Kingsley and the ludicrous Rose McGowan for a bit of international appeal (McGowan's first appearance would raise an embarrassed snigger in an episode of Prison Break - and not too many girls in the 1970's seduced the boys by calling them "cute"...), and layers it all with maudlin melodrama and TV-movie plotting. The NI tourist board brochure has provided the locations - the supposedly clandestine meetings have well known landmarks looming in the background, which places the action in some of the most conspicuous locations in Ireland. Visually it's a trendy, de-saturated muddle that seems to suck out the dramatic point of many scenes - but then so does the constant play for emotional undertones in scenes that are so flatly played and presented that it's impossible to empathise. The silly comic book reduction of "the troubles" is visually reminiscent of the facile UK Government anti-terrorist propaganda TV advertising of the 1980's and 1990's - but the drama is so b-movie formulaic that it loads a bucket load of clichés into a refuse skip that's already full of them. Kingsley shooting from the back of an ambulance at the IRA baddies in hot pursuit? Stand-up sexual encounters against the neon sign atop the Europa Hotel? A street encounter with a soldier that escalates in moments from banter to confrontation to fight to arrest to full-blown-Bloody-Sunday-style riot - complete with the miraculous appearance of THE DISTRAUGHT MOTHER shouting "He's my son!"...? Bad, amateurish, cartoon nonsense. There's plenty of comment about the crude use of music in other IMDb entries, so I won't labour that criticism. It's a blunt, manipulative strategy that indicates the shallowness of the film. An early example of a similar slackness in the overall production design is the inclusion of slick, modern graffiti in the background of some driving scenes. Interesting to see that Belfast graffiti pre-dated the rest of the world in street style by about twenty years... I suppose the director thought that the nice colours and stylised lettering of today's street graffiti would fit in with the slick surface stylings of her masterpiece. That's about as deep as it goes. This movie is an insult to anyone who lived through "the troubles". It's even an insult to more serious films about NI's past, because it perpetuates convenient stereotypes and distorts facts as it pleases. Watch Hunger.

Fifty Dead Men Walking (2008) *1/2 The Irish troubles have proved a reliable subject ground for films, some good good, some great, some blah. Fifty Dead Men Walking certainly does not benefit from me recently seeing Steve McQueen's great Hunger. That film took its subject matter seriously; it was elegant and full of artistic integrity. This film, sadly, is not. And that really is a shame, given the story this film has to tell. Based on the true life experiences of Martin McGartland. McGartland was a small time crook, who when captured and faced with prison was persuaded by Special Branch to inform on the IRA. He eventually moved his way up through their ranks until he was eventually discovered. He managed to escape the IRA by jumping out of a third story window, saved by passers by before anyone else could get to him. He survived an assassination attempt while hiding in Canada, and is still hiding today. The internal conflict for Martin, of informing on old friends with the British, is plumbed, but rarely convincingly. Jim Sturgess plays McGartland. His performance is solid, but nothing special. He spends most of the movie conversing with Fergus (Ben Kingsley), his Special Branch contact. His IRA friends, and old mate Sean (Kevin Zegar, who's performance is good), Mickey, and Rosena Brown (Rose McGowan) are dedicated to the cause. Meanwhile, Martin seems conflicted depending on the situation. The troubles are a complex conflict. Atrocities are committed on both sides. The British have long held Northern Ireland under an oppressive thumb. Catholics rarely were afforded any kind of opportunity, while the planted protestants more or less ran the show. Catholics are the minority in Northern Ireland. Vicious British and Protestant gang action was naturally met with vicious Catholic action, in the form of the IRA. That cycle of violence continued unabated for decades. Fifty Dead Men Walking wants to give a history lesson, but gets too preoccupied with portraying McGartland as an unquestioned hero. It does give some mandatory scenes and conversations telling why the IRA exists, but it feels tacked on. Especially considering that the film really is something of a puff piece for the Brits. An ending blurb tells us that an inquiry found that during the 70s and 80s the British were found to have committed some atrocities. That feels cheap and diversionary after what we've just seen. Nevertheless, the situation is so complicated that I should return to reviewing this movie according to its cinematic merits. Director Kari Skogland (The Stone Angel) seems a poor choice to direct what should be a gritty character piece. She is. The film so desperately wants to be cool that it ends up making its subject matter cliché. It could all be true, but it feels cliché. Its almost as if Skogland was directing a different movie all together. It wants to be some kind of Scorsese crime thriller, but fails. The camera-work tries to be gritty with hand-held shots, a la Bloody Sunday. Elsewhere, Skogland pumps her awful choices for a soundtrack. This complex story deserves a serious film. Instead this one is just so, so poorly directed it's infuriating and finally completely off putting. This is a dark and conflicted plot that Skogland seems to think she can make into a fluffy romp. Sure nasty things happen, but having it wiped away by usually awful pop music is frustrating. In the end everything becomes too standard, too familiar, too cliché. That this story deserved to be handled better, makes the movie worse. The movie might find an audience, with the rising star in Sturgess, and its desperate attempts to be audience friendly. Hunger, on the other hand will likely be left to sit in the wings. That's unfortunate - that great film has all the answers why this one is not. Truly a massive disappointment.

I saw the film at the Toronto Film Festival and liked it a great deal. The film is violent in parts, but this violence is necessary to truly show the times and the conflict that was going on between Ireland and England. I felt that both sides were presented in the movie, never showing too much favor to one or the other. It was a terrible and long period in UK history with far too much death and hate and this movie makes it clear for those of us that have little knowledge of it. I had no idea that this conflict went on for the length of time that it did or how the IRA operated before viewing the film, nor did I know that the IRA was as operational today as it is, they found Martin in hiding and tried to kill him again in Canada years later. Jim's performance as Martin was excellent and believable as was Ben's. I recommend spending the time to see the movie when it is released.

This highly anticipated and very controversial film is based on the true story of IRA infiltrator Martin McGartland during "the Troubles" which plagued Northern Ireland in the 1980s. Here is where I'd normally post a review. The fact is, I have difficulty doing so because there were major problems involving the sound. First, the sound mix on the film left a lot to be desired. I love music and great soundtracks as much if not more than most people, but it was so loud at times that I couldn't hear much dialogue at all. I don't know if it was just because of the venue acoustics or the film's sound mix itself or both, but there were entire segments of the film where the dialogue was completely drowned out by the soundtrack. When one could hear the dialogue, the accents were so thick and heavy that it was extremely difficult to understand. Between the sound mix, the dialects, and the slang I could barely make out about a third of the dialogue. For approximately the first hour I couldn't follow one complete conversation, combining the elements I just mentioned. Now, I attend many films and have seen plenty of movies with thick Irish accents but this one went far beyond any I've seen. Subtitles are definitely needed. Certainly I'm not alone in my opinions. Other reviews do point that out. They also do acknowledge the language challenges and comment on the heavy use of music. Some audience members near me went through most of the film not knowing who was on which side, which was probably exacerbated by the lack of understanding of the dialogue. I don't know how many people walked out but in my section there were dozens. I've also been told that some reviewers even left (for the reasons I mentioned). "Fifty Dead Men Walking Out" seems more appropriate. I've never walked out on a film, ever. I've seen over 500 films just since the start of 2006 at about 30 festivals, and have seen some pretty bad ones, but this was the first time I wanted to leave. I resisted the urge, though, and am glad I did because the exciting second hour of the film was definitely worth waiting for, and the action becomes more important than the dialogue at that point anyway. I'm fairly certain "Fifty Dead Men Walking" will find a US distributor if it hasn't already. Sources close to the film told me that a deal may be announced soon. It definitely deserves a wide release but only if it's subtitled. Otherwise I cannot recommend seeing it except for die-hard fans of the cast members, those who know the story well, or those who have the ability to understand the thickest Irish accents. I just wish I could have understood more of it. Between the the mix on the film itself and the dialect it was quite hard to understand most of the dialogue. Hopefully I'll be able to see it again and give it a positive review but, for now, I simply cannot write about this film properly because I just missed too much to judge it fairly. I might have if I could hear what they were saying.