Director: Peter Sheridan
Writer: Peter Sheridan, Nye Heron
Producer: Pat Moylan, Nye Heron, Arthur Lappin
Based on Irish poet Brendan Behan's experiences in a reform school in 1942. A 16 year-old Irish republican terrorist arrives on the ferry at Liverpool and is arrested for possession of explosives. He is imprisoned in a Borstal in East Anglia, where he is forced to live with his would-be enemies, an experience that profoundly changes his life.
88 min
Rating: 6.2/10
Released
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Top Cast
Shawn Hatosy
Brendan Behan
Danny Dyer
Charlie Milwall
Robin Laing
Jock
Ian McElhinney
Verreker
Eva Birthistle
Liz Joyce
Mark Huberman
Mac
Movie Info
Director: Peter Sheridan
Writer: Peter Sheridan, Nye Heron
Producer: Pat Moylan, Nye Heron, Arthur Lappin
Production Companies: British Screen Productions, BSB, Fís Éireann/Screen Ireland, Dakota Films, Hell's Kitchen, RTÉ, Full Schilling Investments
Countries: United Kingdom, Ireland
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User Reviews
What Others Said
CinemaSerf:
When Brendan Behan (Shawn Hatosy) arrives in Liverpool with a bag full of explosives amidst WWII, he's promptly caught and sent to a youth detention facility in Norfolk. It's run by a fair and open-minded warden (Michael York) who advises his inmates to behave themselves and all will be fine. That's easier said than done, though, as this confirmed Irish republican is not going to naturally fit in with his cohorts. One exception might be navy man Charlie Milwall (Danny Dyer) with whom he becomes quite thick. What now ensues combines a frequently toxic mix of politics, bullying and fluid sexuality with their determination to escape and a degree of humanity and some dark, wartime, humour as the coming-of-age genre takes on a different, less predictable, direction. There are gay undertones, but they are not laboured as the story depicts a broader group of lads who are lost, abandoned by family and society and rudderless - and an engaging rapport between Hatosy and Dyer emerges helping to illustrate that not everyone here knows what the war is for or, indeed, is fighting the same one. It's gritty and the dialogue is honest and ripe without becoming overwhelmingly aggressive or repetitive and by the close these two men came across as decent and honourable. Worth a watch.