Mütter & Söhne

There are some excellent, nuanced performances in this movie, particularly from the two leads, Helen Mirren and Fionnula Flanagan (an underrated character actress best known for her work in "The Others"). But by no means is this easy to watch - and it's best appreciated, whatever your view on the long-standing conflict, if you have some idea of the history first, and the passion that still surrounds Bobby Sands. Tim Pat Coogan's "The Troubles," while a mammoth volume, summarizes the death and destruction that have been visited on all three of the major players - British, Catholic, Protestant.

Interestingly, Helen Mirren also starred in "Cal", another movie about the "Troubles" of Northern Ireland, playing a Protestant widow who falls in love with a Catholic man. In both movies, Mirren's character endures the unthinkable - watching the people she loves best being torn by sectarian violence. Yet in "Cal," Mirren's character is more passive, having things "happen" to her. In "Some Mother's Son", Mirren and Flanagan take action, their passion for their children stirring them to activism, right or wrong.

It was great to see Aiden Gillen, who I first encountered in the British version of Queer as Folk, in a much meatier, more difficult role. Also this is another terrific performance, as always by Helen Mirren. A very moving and sad film.

S0ME MOTHER'S SON is one of the most accurate depictions about the ordinary families caught up in the turmoil and oppression of Northern Ireland. The characters are loosely based on real persons living today, who were caught up in the Great Hunger Strike of 1981. (I know Annie, the Fionnula Flanagan character personally) The British injustice and oppression, portrayed is accurate and no ones imagination, it continues today. Helen Mirren captures the true spirit of the indomitable Irish women, the true heroes of Ireland. Fionnula Flanagan's character is brilliant, and often steals the scene from Ms. Mirren. It has little character insights typical of women of Ulster. Want an accurate movie, about the gallant people of Northern Ireland? this is it! It makes no apologies for the I.R.A.(refreshing.) The I.R.A. may be a grey area to some, but SOME MOTHERS SON shows the viewer that there wouldn't be an I.R.A. if there wasn't British oppression.

Its ashame that more people don't know about this subject. I found this film to be very touching with a very strong moral. Yes the movie is about the I.R.A. and some of its most famous 'soldiers', however, the film touched on who is affected by these actions. I don't agree with the I.R.A but found myself empathetic to the families of the prisoners involved. Despite what the previous poster stated, this movie was pre-911 and touches not on the terrorists acts, but on the consquences of their actions. Helen Mirren was brilliant in this movie, as always. Its not exactley Michael Collins on the subject, and a lot of it was 'glamorized' for Hollywood, but all in all worth watching.

'Some Mother's Son' focuses on the 1981 Maze Prison hunger strike in which the IRA captives demanded to be treated as POW instead of criminals, for they regard their struggle as a war, not 'ordinary' crime. The leader, Bobby Sands, was elected in jail as MP but eventually died on 5 May, 1981. Several mothers then intervened in order to save their sons' lives: they did not want to watch their sons die.

I personally think this film is quite thought-provoking and the acting is convincing. Helen Mirren, as Kathleen Quigley, who has not been aware that her son Gerard (Aidan Gillen) is an IRA soldier, is determined to help her son to survive, while Fionnula Flanagan (Annie Higgins) is terrific as a nationalist mother who is right behind her son's beliefs but eventually witnesses his death, only after losing her other son, who is shot dead by the British Troops.

Some might say many of us are IRA sympathisers and that they are nothing but a bunch of killers, that they are nothing but a bunch of terrorists. However, as one reviewer put, 'there would be no IRA if there was no British oppression'.