ANGELA’S ASHES


USA/UK, 1999, 148 minutes, Colour.
Emily Watson, Robert Carlyle, Joe Breen, Ciaran Owens, Michael Legge, Gerard Mc Sorley.
Directed by Alan Parker.

It is Brooklyn, 1935. The Mc Court family, Malachy Sr and Angela and their four sons, live in a tenement. When their newborn daughter dies, Angela's mother sends money for their fare back to Limerick.

Limerick seems worse than Brooklyn, a life of grinding poverty in the wet and dirty slums of the city. The twin boys die. Frank goes to school and makes his first communion. His mother is a devout Catholic but his alcoholic father, Malachy, is a Catholic 'outsider' from Belfast. While his father often disappears, drinking and wasting his wages, Angela is forced to ask for charity from her family. When Frank is able, he gets a job as a coalman's assistant. The work nearly blinds him with conjunctivitis.

Malachy Sr goes to England to find work. He always promises great things for his family, yet he always drinks his good intentions away. He briefly visits the family in Limerick but then disappears.

When they are evicted, the family live with their cousin, Laman, who demands a sexual liaison with Angela. Frank is now employed delivering telegrams. He meets a young woman, Teresa, who is dying of consumption, and has a brief affair with her. He goes to the church, angry at God, but meets a Franciscan, Fr Gregory, who is able to give him spiritual comfort, absolution and good advice.

Frank also works for a moneylender, doing the rounds to demand repayments. When she dies, he finds her stash of money. He decides to use it to go back to America, despite his mother's pleas.

Frank Mc Court won a Pulitzer Prize for his memoir of growing up in Limerick in the 1930s and 1940s. It sold millions of copies in the English-speaking world. He followed it with another memoir, Tis. Alan Parker's film version is filled with grey clouds and rain, very grim. It is not without some hope, at least for Frank Mc Court who could leave Limerick and go back to America.

The film opens with a comment about the harsh effects of a Catholic childhood: the poverty, the genial but alcoholic father, the mother worn out by bearing children, several of whom die, the hard-hearted extended family and, of course, the strict Irish Catholicism with its piety and devotions, its loyalty and its imposing of doctrine and severe church authorities (especially the Christian Brothers who won't let poor children into their college), the sense of sin and of guilt.

There is far more to Angela's Ashes, especially themes of family relationships and of work and unemployment, but the Church theme pervades, redeemed for Frank by a fine prayer and confession sequence where the adolescent boy goes to the church. As he kneels before a statue of St Francis, a common-sensed and sympathetic priest listens to Frank's faltering words, especially about his sexual encounter with his consumptive girlfriend. He absolves and encourages him.

Australian Laura Jones adapted Mc Court's book. She has written screenplays for High Tide, An Angel at My Table, Oscar and Lucinda and The Well. Alan Parker also re-worked the script and directed the movie. His work over more than two decades includes classics like Bugsy Malone, Fame, Midnight Express, The Commitments and Evita.

Emily Watson is the anchor for the movie giving a sympathetic portrait of Angela, a good woman who has to survive against the overwhelming odds of poverty, loss of children, an alcoholic and deserting husband and an exploitative cousin. Robert Carlyle shows the charm of Malachy Mc Court as well as his ultimate irresponsibility. The three young actors who portray Frank are completely persuasive.

1. An interesting film? Frank Mc Court and his book? The adaptation? The voiceover of the author, his commentary, narrative, wry, the humor? The Irish accent?

2. Limerick and its poverty, the hovels, the constant rain, the streets and the puddles, schools, church, cemeteries, pubs, places of labour? A sense of realism? Score, Irish songs, hymns?

3. The introduction in New York City, the poverty, people crammed in apartments, the large family, Malachy and Angela, the children, pregnancy and birth, death of children, grief? The decision to go to Ireland? To Dublin, no jobs, the trip to Limerick?

4. The portrait of Malachy, from northern Ireland, protestant background, becoming a catholic, his name and accent? His marriage, dapper style, love for the children? Love for Angela? Correct Dhaka her family’s disapproval? Wanting a job, claiming service, no records? Wanting money for the pub? His drinking? The accommodation, the help of the family despite the hostility? His drinking, genial manner, singing? Searching for jobs? Refusalspe? Getting money and drinking it? The children, exasperation, Angela and her worries? With the kids, with Frank, love for his children? Pregnancy, the death of the child, the funeral? A second death? Seemingly hopeless? Trying to save the right things? The sip decision to go to England, the tensions with Angela, sending a telegrams, sudden arrival at Easter, the shock return, the box of chocolates, his leaving and never return? Malachy as a character? Sympathetic or not?

5. The portrait of Angela, her family background, mother, sister, brother? Disapproval of her marriage? Her Catholicism, devout? The New York experience, the death of the child? Her love for Malachy, love for her children? The return to Ireland? Her hopes, the life and drudgery, poverty, hunger, no money? Accommodation, upstairs, the water on the ground floor, the street, the dividing wall and later pulling it down for firewood? Begging from Saint Vincent De Paul, the harshness, the second hand bed, dragging it home, the bed bugs? Birth and death? Her smoking and her nerves? Malachy and his not getting a job, the patience wearing thin, hostility, berating him? Seeing him off to England, no contact? The Easter return? The chocolates? The boys getting older, going to the money lender? Going to the Christian brothers and their slamming the door, urging Frank never to have the door slammed in his face? The landlord ousting them? Going to the cousins, his living upstairs, servants, the sexual demands? Frank rebuking his mother and slapping her? Her visiting him when he left home? A sympathetic portrayal?

6. The grandmother, her help, strong woman, getting the accommodation, the funeral and Saint Vincent De Paul paying for the coffin? The irony of Malachy and his drink on the coffin? Aggie, her gruffness, her angers, buying the clothes for Frank? A touch of kindness? Paddy, his work, drinking, the fish and chips and letting Frank stay? Tough family, surviving?

7. The picture the children, the young Malachy, the other children, pregnancy, the birth of Michael? Malachy eventually leaving going to Dublin?

8. The film as Frank’s story, the three actors portraying him, seen them at the end together?

9. The young Frank, in New York, his plaintive face, old clothes, his experiences, the travel to Ireland? His love for his father, the experience of hunger, the accommodation? Going to school, the fight, his being seen as a Yankee, the strap from the teacher? His father fixing his shoes with rubber, his putting them in the bin, the teacher finding them, against criticising people in need? The children having to say that Jesus did not sport shoes on the cross? The class preparation for communion, tongues out, the paper wafers? The issue of the collection of money at first communion time, the teacher and his denunciation of the filth of Hollywood? The first confession, the boy coming out weeping, Frank confessing according to the ritual, asking if he was the worst? Confessing dirty talk and explaining who the boy was? The scene of the two talking, whispering and young Malachy not hearing? The first communion, his difficulties in swallowing, the priest urging him to swallow? The grandmother with the communion breakfast, not allowed to go collecting, his vomiting in the yard, the grandmother and her scruple, God in the yard? Urging him to confession, the ritual again, one day, asking the priest about the yard, the grandmother wanting to know whether to use ordinary water or holy water, the next confession, one minute, the priest rebuking the grandmother, to stop bothering him? Going to the pictures, Angels with Dirty Faces, the later films, westerns, The Mummy, the kids laughing and yelling? Juxtaposing of the two actors?

10. Frank growing up, his friends, at school, his father leaving, the confirmation, the bishop and his catechism questions, Frank fainting, typhoid, his time in the hospital, the doctor and his farting and Frank sure that he would live? His parents were rallying to him? The father going back to England, his following him in the street? The discussions about class after he lost time, in Malachy’s class, the teacher and the essay, ‘Jesus and the weather’, if Jesus lived in Limerick? The teacher impressed, going to the higher teacher, Frank and his candle after finding the penny, going to a higher class, his reading Shakespeare, the words like jewels in the mouth, the kindly neighbor and discussing Shakespeare? His enjoyment of school? His getting the job, the coal and the dirt, the effect on his eyes (not able to see the movie) and stopping work?

11. Frank as a teenager? At school, enjoying the enthusiastic teacher and his opening up worlds? The imagination? The priest and the sermon on purity, Mary turning away, the warning against sexual behavior? The boys and masturbation? The issue of confession, finding the 90 year old priest, his being replaced and Frank’s embarrassment? His father not returning, his mother and her needs, the poverty, the leaving home, getting the job, Aggie getting him the suit, the meeting, the job, deliveries, going to the house, meeting Teresa, drying his clothes, naked, the sexual encounter, the relationship? TB and her needs? The other deliveries, the nuns not giving a tip? The visit to the Christian Brothers and their abrupt turning him away? Teresa’s death, the funeral, the priest and his words? Frank and his earnings, his first pint, drinking, singing in the street, his mother upset, his rebuke about her relationship with the cousin, slapping his mother?

12. The next day, going to the church, praying in front of the statue of Saint Francis, the Franciscan friar, friendly, urging him to talk to St Francis when he did not want to go to confession, Frank and the reviewing of his whole life, the priest giving absolution? Frank and his worry about Teresa going to hell, the priest saying she would have had help in the hospital, but, more importantly, God and his forgiveness, and Frank forgiving himself?

13. The clergy, the priest and confession, the bishop and confirmation, the priest and the purity sermon, the kindly Franciscan? The abrupt Christian Brother? The men at the Saint Vincent De Paul Society, using their authority, mocking Angela, slighting her? Her turning on them?

14. The obese cousin, allowing them to stay, their cooking for him, waiting on him, chamber pot, his demands on Frank? The sexual demands and Angela? Frank leaving?

15. The people of Limerick, his mother with the local women, the local men and work, pubs? The kids in school? Issues of social class?

16. The portrait of the teachers, lay teachers, the teacher against Yanks, and ridiculing the poor, Jesus with no shoes on a cross, preparation for communion, the pieces of paper as wafers and making Frank think about the presence of God, the collection, the teacher’s denunciation of the films and Hollywood filth? Irish as the country’s language, English the language of the enemies, Latin the language to get into heaven, those who would not learn it and were in danger?

17. The money lender, her asking Frank to write letters, his skills, his mother reading one of them and his embarrassment? Going to see the woman, finding her dead, taking the money, throwing her account book into the river?

18. Frank buying his ticket, money to go to New York, the Statue of Liberty? Frank Mc Court and his career, overcoming origins?