The Magdalene Sisters **** (2002, Geraldine McEwan, Anne-Marie Duff, Eileen Walsh, Dorothy Duffy, Nora-Jane Noone) – Classic Movie Review 2144

Writer-director Peter Mullan’s austere 2002 drama stars Geraldine McEwan, who gives a tour de force as the sadistic Catholic Sister Bridget at a Sixties Irish girls’ institution, a Magdalene Sisters Asylum for young women. There, imprisoned indefinitely, four new inmates arrive in 1964 to endure a life of torment and dehumanising abuse because of their so-called sinful behaviour, forced to do workhouse laundry and hard labour.

A horrifying, depressing true story is squeezed for all its heart-wrenching drama by director Mullan in best Ingmar Bergman style. It is extremely well done, but probably no one would even think of wanting to see it twice.

Anne-Marie Duff, Nora-Jane Noone, Eileen Walsh and Dorothy Duffy also star. Also in the cast are Eamonn Owens, Mary Murray, Britta Smith, Frances Healy, Eithne McGuinness, Phyllis MacMahon and Rebecca Walsh.

Violence, nudity, sex and very strong language.

Bafta-winning actress Geraldine McEwan died at 82 on January 30 2015 after treatment for a stroke. McEwan played Alice, a Lady attending on Emma Thompson’s Katharine, in Kenneth Branagh’s Henry V (1989) and the witch Motianna in Robin Hood Prince of Thieves (1991).

© Derek Winnert 2015 Classic Movie Review 2144

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