A Terrible Beauty

The Night Fighters makes use of Robert Mitchum's marvelous gift for speech mimicry as he adopts and Irish brogue for a film set in Northern Ireland in 1941. The brogue would be put to better use later on in a far better film, Ryan's Daughter.

To put in historical context, France has fallen and the British are waging war without allies on the continent for a year now. The Germans contact elements of the old Irish Republican Army and they're looking for a rising like Easter of 1916 that will drain British troops to defend the country and free the six counties who were left behind.

So the local commandant Dan O'Herlihy raises such a force in his local area and recruits buddies Robert Mitchum and Richard Harris for the group. They do a raid and one of their number is killed and Mitchum and Harris are fugitives. All the worse because as history records the Nazis never did attempt an invasion of Great Britain, they went to the Soviet Union instead.

Mitchum and Harris are a pair who would rather raise a tankard of beer than a country see this was for nothing. That leads to all kinds of complications down the road.

I'm not sure what the point to The Night Fighters really was. The film ending was anti-climatic to say the least. I will say that Mitchum's character had a lot of Victor McLaglen's Gypo Nolan from The Informer in him. The Night Fighters never reaches to the dramatic heights that the John Ford classic did.

In fact The Night Fighters is known primarily for the fact that after hours Robert Mitchum got into a pub brawl with some of the locals and he came out on top. Many different versions of the story got into the media around the world, but I suggest you read Lee Server's meticulously researched and delightfully written biography of Mitchum to get the real story. I can't repeat it here due to the language.

Mitchum fans might like The Night Fighters, but it will never be at the top of his best screen performances.

I had hoped from the opening sequence that it would feature the IRA in collaboration with the Nazis.However it developed in a different direction.Iit is just rather dull with little pace.

You know what that means, two characters such as those one on a shooting, as Robert Mitchum with Stanley Baker during Bob Aldrich's THE ANGRY HILLS; I mean booze is never far from the "companionship" that may rise between the likes of Mitchum, Harris and Baker, so notorious heavy drinkers. And they were not the only ones.....So this Tay Garnet's film, as several from this same director, offer some John Ford's accents, elements: Irish, men's atmosphere, saloon fist fights. And there were not so many movies speaking if iRA in those days, the sixties decade. Good film but not my favourite from POSTMAN ALWAYS RINGS TWICE director.

During WWII in a small Irish town, Dermot O'Neill (Robert Mitchum) is recruited into the IRA along with other locals including Sean Reilly (Richard Harris). He starts by stealing guns from a British armoury, but the next mission however to destroy a power station results in several deaths and Reilly is injured and the two have to go on the run. O'Neill remains patriotic but questions the value of what they are doing and particularly the principles that drive them when Reilly is captured and high and mighty and cowardly leader Don McGinnis (Dan O'Herlihy - v. Good) won't risk the group to rescue Reilly. In addition, when McGinnis threatens to attack the 'traitorous' Irish police, O'Neill says he'll report them and of course they turn against him.

The film partly considers the rights and wrongs of the campaign and its collaboration with the Nazis, but mostly it considers the difficulties faced balancing loyalties to Ireland vs loyalty to family and friends. Mitchum is terrific here and works particularly well with Harris - one can only speculate as to how much Irish Whiskey got drunk on this set. There is also tremendous support from stalwarts like Cyril Cusack and Niall MacGinnis. It all adds up to an enjoyable, witty and occasionally moving tale, just very occasionally straying into 'top of the morning to you' cliche.

Richard Harris and Robert Mitchum star as Irishmen and the tale is set in the early years of WWII. It seems that the Germans want to encourage the IRA to renew hostilities against the British in Northern Ireland's six counties. Why? Well, then the Brits will be so busy trying to put down this rebellion that the Germans will have an easier time beating them in the war. Some quickly fall for the German agent's appeals...some are wondering if the cost just isn't worth it in this proverbial deal with the Devil!

The acting, as you expect, is quite good. The story, although interesting to me since I used to teach history, might not appeal to so many viewers...particularly if they are not Irish or British. It's definitely one of Mitchum and Harris' more obscure films but that doesn't mean it's bad at all. Well worth your time.