THE GENERAL ***½ (out of four)
-a review by Bill Chambers ( wchamber@netcom.ca )
(Season's Greetings from FILM FREAK CENTRAL:
http://filmfreakcentral.net )
starring Brendan Gleeson, Jon Voight, Adrian Dunbar, Maria Doyle Kennedy
screenplay by John Boorman, based on the novel by Paul Williams
directed by John Boorman
After a screening of The General, I was approached by a journalist from Ireland who told me how much his people loathed professional thief Martin Cahill. Boorman's take on Cahill's life is sympathetic, but it hardly glorifies the crook's existence. (The more powerful Cahill becomes, the more he acts like a shut-in.) According to said journalist, it might upset certain moviegoers in his homeland for its humane treatment of Cahill, but after considering the film carefully, they'll conclude the same thing he did: there just isn't any other way to tell the story.
The picture opens with an innovative flashback technique: Cahill (Gleeson) gets up in the morning, goes to his car, and before he can pull out into the street, he is shot by a stranger-at which point the images literally start moving in reverse; the bullet is ushered back into the barrel of the gun, and we are transported to a time when Cahill was a young lad (here portrayed ably The Butcher Boy's Eamonn Owens-talk about type-casting) who robbed local markets to feed his hungry family. Later, in a reformatory, a priest attempts to molest him-adolescent Cahill defends himself, and is punished with slaps from the pious pedophile. (For the rest of the film, whenever confronting figures of authority, Cahill shields his face with his hands, skulking into a fetal position as if trying to slide right out of his skin.)
Despite the constant threat of imprisonment from Police Inspector Ned Kenny (Voight), Cahill does little to correct his rebellious ways. He is married to the loving Francis (Kennedy) but openly carries on an affair with her sister, Tina (Angeline Ball)-he even fathers a boy with her. Meanwhile, he and his gang of affable hoods move from petty larceny to a jewelry store heist and the theft of a priceless Vermeer painting. (His innocent appreciation of art would disturb collectors, as he treats said piece like a carnival poster.) Throughout, Cahill's disposition remains the same: non-chalant, sometimes arrogant, but he never forgets his roots. (A T-shirt adorned with cartoon pigs remains his preferred attire even with millions in gold bricks at his disposal.)
The General was shot in black and white, and it's unforgiving in its physical observation of these characters' craggy, lived-in faces. Seamus Deasy's cinematography glamourizes Cahill and co. no more than Boorman's script. Cahill was not Pretty Boy Floyd, after all; the possible key to his adult behaviour is revealed when the townspeople applaud young Martin's antics: here's a man who just wants to feel like a hero to a community, no matter how small that community becomes. He fancies himself a modern day Robin Hood-stealing from the rich but for the sake of theatrics and not any sort of noble cause. Father to one, husband to two, gang leader, and number one threat to Kenny's ego, Cahill was ultimately just a son of a bitch who got carried away-few people had the guts to rein him in. I grew to like Cahill the movie character as I suspect I would grow to like many an outlaw in real life, because of his conviction. Gleeson's performance is a marvel, the sort of seamless, un-showy turn that goes largely unrewarded by the populace. By all accounts, his impersonation of Cahill's ticks and mannerisms are pinpoint accurate.
Deliverance aside, Boorman had until now not made a truly complete and humane film. (Is it any coincidence that he and Voight, the star of Deliverance, reunited for what might prove to be Boorman's best work?) Perhaps all those years of editing Britain's "Projections" anthologies have made him a more thoughtful filmmaker. Towards the end of the film, Cahill and his son have the kind of moment many a Hollywood crime drama wouldn't think to include-The General is like a pastiche of those bits between killings that all too often hit the cutting room floor.
-December, 1998
The review above was posted to the
rec.arts.movies.reviews newsgroup (de.rec.film.kritiken for German reviews).
The Internet Movie Database accepts no responsibility for the contents of the
review and has no editorial control. Unless stated otherwise, the copyright
belongs to the author.
Please direct comments/criticisms of the review to relevant newsgroups.
Broken URLs inthe reviews are the responsibility of the author.
The formatting of the review is likely to differ from the original due
to ASCII to HTML conversion.
Related links: index of all rec.arts.movies.reviews reviews