The new 50m pool (that isn’t) is open at Harvey Hadden, so
we all go for a swim. They have the whole 50m at their disposal but attempt to
cram everyone into a quarter of the pool. I think they are taken aback that opening
on a bank holiday is popular and before long they open the whole of one 25m
side. By the time we leave they are opening part of the other side as well.
From there we head straight to the train station where we drop
Daughter off for the trip back to Manchester.
We head to Broadway later for a couple of beers, food and
the film ‘Brooklyn’.
Ellis arrives in New York seasick and bewildered. She works
as a salesperson in a department store and takes night classes in accounting as
advised by Father Flood (Jim Broadbent). Initially she misses home but
gradually adapts to her new environment.
Then tragedy strikes back home as her sister dies and Ellis
is suddenly heading back to Ireland. Tony is smart and a bit cheeky in that he
gets her name on a marriage certificate before she leaves in hope that this will
ensure her return.
Despite intending that her return to Ireland would be brief,
her stay extended to include a friend's wedding and she reluctantly settles
back into life in Enniscorthy along with its small-town mind set. She gets
offered a job and another husband, as she is pursued by an old friend in Jim
Farrell (Domhnall Gleeson).
The film tries to have us believe that she is torn between the
familiarity of her old life in Ireland and the excitement of her new one in
Brooklyn. That is as well as being torn between the two men in her life, one of
which she’s already married to. Unfortunately while the film presents a pretty
solid case for Brooklyn, the Irish case is far from convincing and, quite
rightly, Ellis eventually legs it back to America. Anything else really
wouldn't have been believable.
Overall though the film is excellent, nothing flash just
good old fashioned filmmaking of the kind that a lot of film makers seem to
have lost the ability to produce without resorting to special effects and
multiple plot twists.
It is without doubt Ronan’s film although kudos to Julie
Walters, who as Ellis’s landlady Mrs Kehoe gets to deliver most of the best
lines of the film around the dining table of her boarding house.
We round off the night with a beer in the Lord Roberts.
(Monday 28th December)
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