An Irish Angel

'An Irish Angel' is a tale of angst, stress and a strive for acceptance. The themes in 'Angel' are common ones that many young adults can identify with during the confusing, competitive high school years. At the center of the film is Niamh James 'Aine' title character (pronounced Onya), who struggles with her inner demons now that she's pregnant, whilst hiding the fact from her mother, Margaret (Amanda Doherty). This secret dominates the entire film and even when its out, helps us understand how one's environment growing up can have a major impact on their choices in life.

The premise offers director Danny Patrick a lot to work with, and his signature comedic, dramedy tone is a constant throughout 'Angel.' Everything from the way scenes are shot to the quirky music are dripping with proverbial eye rolls, and they all work. Sure, there are a few moments that could cause general audiences gasp, but most of them are done in a way that is not mean-spirited or in poor taste. Aside from Niamh's A+ performance, others in the supporting cast don't disappoint, from Jaime Winstone to Julian Glover's priest.

'An Irish Angel' has the building blocks to become a cult classic for this generation.

Aine (Niamh James) is in her senior year in a Catholic school in Portush, Northern Ireland and desperately wants to go travel the world, but she's just found out she's pregnant. This causes conflict with her widowed mother Margaret (Amanda Doherty).

Aine is someone who can be inconsiderate, selfish, insecure, good-hearted, ambitious beyond her abilities, naïve, fun, and able to redeem herself. In other words, she is a confused teenager on the cusp of adulthood and Niamh James plays the part superbly.

It has sharp directing by Danny Patrick who also wrote the screenplay. There are also engaging sidebar stories including other characters that add greatly to the main mother-daughter conflict: the despair of losing a job later in life; financial burdens; periodic depression; the inner-conflict of being young and Catholic; the futility of social climbing; the belief that "there" is better than "here".

The coming-of-age genre is so common that it's difficult to raise the bar. "An Irish Angel" at least meets the standard and then some though it could have been more. In fairness, the two lead performances do stand out especially that of Amanda Doherty. She shows so much push-pull with her daughter while trying to come to grips that her daughter has made the same mistake she did in getting pregnant young. She also has the brilliant ability to let the emotions build gradually and then attempt (as we do in real life) to resist them until the attempt is futile. No wonder Amanda Doherty is winning so many awards and award nominations. While she gives a rich performance, I believe the film would have been greater if she had been given even more screen time.

This engaging dramatic-comedy from Danny Patrick is an absolute gem and one of the best independent films that has come out for a while. There are a number of divergent plot lines intricately woven, which culminate together in a highly climactic way, but the film still manages to maintain its charm and simplicity throughout. An Irish Angel works on a number of different levels, but foremost as an entertaining rites-of-passage teen movie, with numerous sophisticated elements that raise the movie well above its situated genre - especially the very cleverly conceived dream sequences that lend the movie an interesting art house feel.

The main story thread follows teenager Aine, expertly played by newcomer Niamh James, who is struggling to come to terms with what exactly she is going to do about her unplanned pregnancy - which resulted from an unwise short-term fling with her school's "King of Cool" (who happens to be the boyfriend of her best friend, Corinna). She finds that the people in her life, including those she turns to for help, have confusingly different perspectives on what she should do, which only adds to her anxiety; but an encounter with an old priest, Fr Reital (warmly played by veteran English actor Julian Glover) triggers her entrance into a spiritual dreamscape where she explores her life dilemmas with a mysterious Christ-like figure - who just happens to look uncannily like her grumpy school caretaker, who everyone calls "The Strap" (brilliantly played by Shane Robinson). It's an example of how Patrick mixes kitchen sink drama with off-the-wall artistic vision in a combination which always intrigues.

What really steals the show, however, is the exuberant performance of another young newcomer, Todd Bell, as Aine's school-friend and sidekick, Leo - a boy from the wrong side of the tracks, who aspires to be a famous actor. He gains the lead role as "Pulcinella" in the school play of the same name, directed by the school's liberal drama teacher, Ellie (Jamie Winstone - who seems made the part), and "Pulcinella" provides the movie with a number of apt thematic tropes as we go on. As the various plotlines develop, we follow the school rehearsals of the play, which constitutes an amusing parody of an Elizabethan drama (based on a 18th century Italian ballet), whose pseudo-Shakespearean dialogue seems to have been expressly created for the purpose by Patrick. Much of the comedy comes from Leo's wide-eyed aspirations for fame, and to make it with the play's leading lady (Aine's good-looking best-friend Corinna), which conflicts with the gritty reality of his life - especially as he becomes embroiled in the crazy schemes of an incompetent band of local wannabe gangsters, led by his brother Padraig (the gloriously tattooed Baz Back). This latter plotline ultimately leads to high drama, tragedy and pathos, and is important to the life-affirming conclusion to the movie.

Altogether this is a funny, dramatic, and, at times, emotively profound movie, that punches far above its weight and is well worth taking a chance on.

I thought this movie was promising, premise wise. It was refreshing in the sense that it didn't feel like your average Independent Artsy Movie; it felt more or less like a movie with something to say. Which is charming actually, the cinematography is beautiful I loved it.

To me this movie over delivered on some points, and undelivered in others. Like I said I liked the directing style, I liked how unconventional the characters looked. Mostly in films; teenagers are being physically portrayed as beauty pageant contestants or extremely good looking cheer leaders etc.. but over here they looked more realistic and believable as teenagers. I loved the way this movie represented the family unit, in that it wasn't too good to be true but wasn't too unreal either. Millions of Irish People probably grew up in such families which seems more relatable to the viewer.

I have to focus on the ways in which this film fell short for me at least. The plot was very cliche, the same as every other coming of age movie. Teen finds herself pregnant, teen fights with parent to gain her independence, parent resist teen's independence and then teen starts rebelling out of frustration and so on.

The plot was quite the cookie-cutter. It was predictable and we have seen it many times. The only difference is the setting & the characters really. I felt like the idea of the family going through "financial difficulties" was just thrown in for good measures. I kinda wished they threw that out of the plot all together, it didn't seem to actually affect the plot in anyway other than dramatic effect.

So yeah, overall pretty good film but I felt it lacked on originality and it wasn't as "deep" as I had hoped it would be.

An Irish Angel is a lot like the time in which it takes place. The film has a lot of note to say, but you get the sense that it has a good time just being there. By 2017, The Good Friday Agreement was in the rear-view mirror, as were much of the struggles of the previous decades. It was almost like people were sick and tired of caring about trauma.

Our film shows us the trials and tribulations of Aine just looking to navigate the world of a teenage girl. There are plenty of familiar faces in this cast with Jaime Winstone and Julian Glover, but nobody really outshines the leads Niamh James and Todd Bell. The film is paced in a manner that lets us know about the characters. The most memorable scenes in the film are more painful than funny with Aine's Nightmares.

Danny Patrick's films the action is from a completely neutral vantage point. There is nothing at all pretentious or preachy about any of the subject matter. The film ramps up the humor of other Teen fare, but shadows that with the tragic desperation that modern teenagers face, this film is worth taking a look at.