Starring Emily Watson, Robert Carlisle, Joe Breen, Ciaren Owens, Michael Legge. Directed by Alan Parker. Frank McCourt (Breen) is 5 years-old, and the oldest in his Irish family living in New York. His baby sister Margaret dies. His mother Angela (Watson) is heavily depressed, his father Malachi (Carlisle) has taken off to drink, and the kids are starving. Tenants in their parish, appalled by the state of the family, ship them back to Limerick, Ireland. They end up in a cold, damp dump provided by Frank's aunt, uncle and grandmother. All four boys and the parents sleep in one bed for warmth. Soon, the consumption takes one of the children. Another dies of cold and malnutrition. Malachi, a northern-Ireland protestant, can rarely find work in Catholic Limerick, so the family lives off the dole, and vouchers from the condescending local parish council, who pretty much make them beg for their meagre charity. When dad does get work, he invariably spends it all drinking Guinness at the pub while his family is at home cold and starving, and then loses the jobs he does get because he misses work the next day. As he grows up, Frank (Owens) gets into fights at school, suffers repeated punishments for the smallest of infractions, and gets a bit of fun "interfering" with himself. He takes up shovelling coal for some money, but has to stop because his eyes become so infected he almost goes blind. He also enjoys going to the local Lyric theatre to see Cagney films and Westerns, whenever he can sneak in or scrape up the schilling to buy a ticket. He begins to write and read a bit, especially enjoying Shakespeare. And he longs to return to America. Based on Frank McCourt's Pulitzer Prize winning novel, Angela's Ashes is a relentlessly bleak examination of McCourt's impoverished childhood growing up in Limerick, Ireland. Shot after shot is made of heavy rains, drenched and dirty streets, flooded floors, cold and damp walls and dirty and inadequate housing. Scene after scene involves the characters looking for food, complaining they're hungry and eating gruel or poor quality food. And Mom and Dad love to smoke, it seems even more than they love to eat or feed their kids. The teachers, save older Frank's latter one, are cruel and ravenously anti-Protestant. The Catholic Church comes across as rigid, keeping the faithful in line through threat of eternal damnation. Their parishoners grinding poverty seems to be of little concern. I haven't read his book, but there must be something positive he recollects. Other than the self "interfering", and splashing in water, things are grim from start to finish. Even Frank's one experience with love ends in tragedy with the girl's death by consumption. The only real signs of life or happiness in the film exist when Frank's uncle appears on screen, cracking jokes and telling stories. The performances are joyless but solid throughout. Watson barely cracks a smile as the suffering Angela of the book's title. She reportedly began smoking for the part, and found it difficult to stop after the movie was finished filming. She exudes a degree of strength in her attempt to keep her family together. Carlisle plays Frank's dad as a amiable, but weak man. He runs to the bottle every time he gets money, but goes days at a time without a drink, so was he an alcoholic, or just a man who just hated himself and couldn't deal with his life? All three young men are quite good as Frank. Many people have told me what a wonderful book Angela's Ashes is, how well written and how inspiring it is. While the movie is well made, and demonstrates the harshness of Irish life, the inspiration did not translate particularly well to the film. If you would like to respond, please click the E-Mail Press Here To Go To The Review List Page