Cal - Memórias de um Terrorista

A strangely and unhappily compelling film from the pen over the wildly over-rated Bernard MacLaverty. The script piles improbability on improbability but, given that its premise is so unlikely, perhaps that is the point, a kind of coincidental momentum of the poor and the bad.

Helen Mirren doesn't fare too well as an RUC widow - there are many Irish actresses who could have suited and played this role much more convincingly. John Lynch is fine, looks the part, capturing something of the long-haired, unwashed aesthetic of the hunger-strikers of the time. The best performance is easily by Donal McCann as Lynch's Da, greasily working up a sweat at the local slaughterhouse. Ray McAnally is wasted in a small part.

I wouldn't recommend it to anyone, but it's an interesting addition to the Troubles archive. Some fine photography and backdrops go a long way towards salvaging a rotten script.

It's interesting to see Irish reviewers' takes on movies like this. I haven't seen Cal in years, but I still listen to the beautiful soundtrack by Mark Knopfler. I put it on this morning, which is why I thought to look up the movie here.

I remember being captivated by the drama of this young kid in over his head, both with the IRA and in his romance with an older woman. The scenes had a raw grittiness that felt very real to me when I saw it in the theater, back in the mid-1980s.

So it's surprising to me to hear the film described by at least one reviewer here as both unlikely and clichéd. And I can't argue with that, in terms of history or culture or politics, because I wasn't there. Anyone who lived in Belfast at the time would surely have a more realistic view of the IRA and of Irish culture than I do.

But this morning, my young son looked up when that first song came on, and gave me a look, like, "What in the world is this?" After the song ended, he said, "Dad, it's so beautiful, it almost hurts." That's how I always felt about Cal. I'm a sucker for anything that's both beautiful and sad. That's how I remember the movie.

Although I had never watched this because it was rather difficult for me so that the IRA and the bombs still so near in the 70s. But when I saw Neil Jordan's, the wonderful, Angel (1982) I bought it. But I still didn't watch it although after I'd seen Kenneth Branagh's Belfast (2021) then I thought surely I was brave enough to watch this. Of course it turns out that it is not at all terrible or harrowing and it becomes to be more like a romance. There is still some killing and fighting and burning but nothing like as it could have been. It begins well but becomes just a bit silly towards the end. I also thought that Helen Mirren was fine but no idea how she had an award at Cannes. She had been fantastic in The Long Good Friday (1980) and also Hussy the same year and even rather brave with Caligula (1979). I guess that it was difficult doing, The Cook, the Thief & Her Lover (1989) but was one of her best but Cal is only okay.

I enjoyed this film very much particularly because of its Irish flavor. John Lynch is incredibly real as an IRA member(not of his own doing) who really hasn't the stomach for it. Everything about the film is as it should be. Lynch's long suffering Cal who has helped murder the Protestant husband of the woman he is now infatuated with is wonderfully portrayed. Day to day life of the people is almost like watching a documentary. Cal's guilt-ridden life couldn't be more boring from playing his guitar to borrowing tapes at the library to spying on Marcella all the time aware that the UVC will burn him and his "Da" out.

Love the Irish lingo and wit as well as the Uilleann pipes and traditional Irish soundtrack that make it sing. The sensual relationship between Cal and Marcella is bound to take off but you know it is doomed from the start. Two people searching for meaning in a harsh and lonely world. Helen Mirren gives another great performance as the unsatisfied older woman giving in to love. If you want to see a simple film about real people don't miss this sad, revealing tale.

One of my all time favorites.

The film "Cal" is about a young boy who falls in love with Marcella, both Catholic. Cal "works" for the IRA, and he participated in the killing of Marcella's husband. Cal wants to get out of the IRA, but that's not too easy. Anyway, the whole story is really about the relationship between Cal and Marcella, a great Irish love story. A story with an Irish ending...