and influence across the globe, yet nonetheless we are prone to ignorantly quoting Jimmy Rabbitte and calling ourselves “The Blacks of Europe”. We have the fourth highest GDP on Earth and still we posit that being a white Irish person is comparable with the experiences of BIPOC. The “no dogs, no blacks, no Irish” mindset quickly became “no dogs, no blacks” as we as a nationality began to make up the majority of the American police force all the way back in the 1800s. Even John Timoney, the inventor of ‘The Miami Model’: a series of techniques used by the US police force to violently suppress large scale protests, was born in Dublin in the 1940s. Nonetheless, the recent Wild Mountain Thyme, made by Irish-American John Patrick Shanley, features Emily Blunt, Jamie Dornan and Christopher Walken abusing and twisting the Irish accent until it becomes something grotesque. This, coupled with a weak plot and jarringly boring dialogue, makes for a disappointing film that has fallen victim to heaps of negative reviews. Why would the director of Moonstruck (John Patrick Shanley, 1987) (arguably one of the greatest rom-coms of all time) embarrass himself and his impressive cast with such a ridiculous movie? Why did they decide to dedicate an entire scene to depicting a group of 21st century Irish people standing in awe of a Rolls Royce? Where did this softcore paddywhackery come from in the first place? Are we as a nation responsible for this manipulated idea of Irishness? We send our head of state to the White House every St. Patrick’s day with a gift of Shamrocks. We sent Riverdance to the Eurovision. We invited Barack Obama to drink pints of Guinness in Moneygall and we get Daniel O’Donnell to sing when the Pope comes to visit. This paddywhackery of Irish people is in no way oppressive, it is, in fact, a beast of our own creation. It is clear that the population of the Republic of Ireland has no grounds to base their arguments for persecution. Despite the fact that the likes of Wild Mountain Thyme are still being made in the 21st century, it is not indicative of where Irish people are situated in the global zeitgeist. Wild Mountain Thyme was no more than a box office flop designed to pander to Irish Americans who long for the Celtic twilight of the motherland. It’s release roughly coincided with Normal People, which became the most streamed TV
series on BBC in 2020. This clearly indicates that we as a nation can represent ourselves as civilised and literate, an image of Irish nationality that is congruent with the way we are perceived globally. Ireland is home to masters of poetry, prose, playwriting and performance. With a film scene that is valued at $557.3 million dollars and constantly growing, we are assuredly going to be producing filmmakers at the same caliber of our literary and theatrical icons. As our country moves from the destitution of the early 20th century into the financial excessive early-mid 21st century, our body of art moves with it; concerning itself less with the direct consequences of 800 years of colonisation and more with the indirect ramifications of past oppression. Our cultural export has evolved from musicals about Michael Collins to Normal People’s depiction of a translucent class divide perpetrated by a historically Protestant university. Let us not get hung up on Lenny Abrahamson (who’s oeuvre extends beyond television to must see films: Adam & Paul (2004), Garage (2007), etc). Read your Wikipedia articles, scrounge the streaming sites and discover the work of the Sheridan family, Nora Twomey, Aisling Walsh and more. The representation of Irish people in cinema is in our hands now. We have wrestled it from John Ford and John Patrick Shanley and we are sitting upon a goldmine of actors, writers and directors who all have stories to tell.
cathal eustace
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