Song of Granite

I was really looking forward to watching this film. I love Irish folk music. I enjoy indie and art house films. I really wanted to enjoy this film.

Sadly, I have to say that I found it to be a poorly made film. It didn't quite know whether it was a biopic or a documentary as it was primarily reenactments, but randomly tossed in documentary footage.

There is absolutely no information given to help the viewer understand when or where the film was taking place, or who the characters were. If you didn't have a passing knowledge of Heaney's life, you would be absolutely lost. I found myself guessing everything.

It was just a disjointed series of long boring shots with a musical performance tossed in now and then. No story. No proper dialogue. It really came off as a pretentious college film project. Purposely arty, but without any compelling content.

And while the cinematography was very striking at times, it was just not enough to carry a feature length project. I generally hate when a reviewer calls a film "boring", but I can honestly say that this about the most boring film I've ever watched. I never thought it was possible to make Irish folk boring :-)

Very disappointed.

This is certainly not a normal documentary, nor is it merely a collection of songs. It presents a good sense of Joe Heaney's life by re-enacting parts of his life with a little documentary footage. I would have preferred a bit of narration to clarify what was happening and more of the enjoyable old Irish songs. However, I found the odd background music annoying.

You can hear the waves and almost feel the turf fire burning when you get a glimpse into Joe Heaney's childhood memories and get a feel for the culture and place where his songs came from. Sure it's not a narrative documentary. It'll give you a feel for joe heaney's world though if you wanted a glimpse into the probable life of a old style Irish singer

This film is such a breath of fresh air. The cinematography, the acting, the singing it all comes together so well, Pat Collins cast and crew deserve high praise. My only complaint is that I am just now aware of its existence and that I didn't have the pleasure of seeing this movie projected. Beautiful!

I read quite a few of the reviews and they all praised the movie but it was not for m e. I thought it was long and drawn out. I didn't like the music and I could not wait till the movie was over.