Damian O'Donovan (Cillian Murphy) and Teddy O'Donovan (Pádraic Delaney) are Irish brothers in the Ken Loach film The Wind that Shakes the Barley. (Christal Films)
For almost four decades, English director and unofficial socialist Ken Loach (Poor Cow, Land and Freedom) has chosen to tell his stories with a hammer even when a feather would do. It’s not to say he’s not right, just righteous. Political certainty isn’t a liability in his latest film, an emotional period piece that portrays occupied Ireland in the 1920s, as British forces push two Irish brothers into a guerrilla war with the Crown. Thoughtful, pragmatic Damien (the wonderful Cillian Murphy) is on his way to London for a career as a doctor when his village is brutalized by the infamous Black and Tan soldiers; he misses his train and stays to fight with his brother, Teddy (Pádraic Delaney). Damien’s slow transformation into a revolutionary, and the surprising fraternal discord it affects, are the core of the story; whenever Loach’s patented proselytizing — naturalistically, beautifully delivered by a superb cast — returns to these brothers, our hearts get as much of a workout as our minds. Ireland, its fields waving in the wind, is as innocent as all occupied places and as corrupted as its historical circumstances. It’s a resonant and topical note that Loach surely intends to strike, and does.
The Wind That Shakes the Barley screens at TIFF Sept. 7 and Sept. 9.
Katrina Onstad writes about the arts for CBC.ca.
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