Customer Reviews

When Brendan Met Trudy [VHS]

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

John Houseman once asked the Irish actor Hilton Edwards what was the most characteristic Irish trait. "Malice!" Edwards answered, without missing a beat. I never understood that quote until I became familiar with the novels and screenplays of Roddy Doyle. Whether the story is funny ("The Commitments") or serious ("Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha") Doyle's assorted Dubliners are unremittingly hostile toward each other, apt to show both affection and disapproval by a cuff alongside the head, and utterly certain to greet the odd romantic or idealist with a swift kick in the pants. "When Brendan Met Trudy," probably Doyle's lightest work to date, illustrates this perfectly. Brendan (beautifully played by Peter McDonald) is a shy, movie-obsessed, computer-hating Dublin schoolmaster who falls for Trudy (Flora Montgomery, a brazen delight), a young woman distinctly from the wrong side of the tracks. Falling in love does indeed change Brendan's life, involving him in everything from cat burglary to international politics. But it doesn't change his life in any of the ways love normally does in the movies! His students and fellow teachers hate him before he falls for Trudy, and hate him even more afterwards--his outbursts of joy are taken as psychosis, his attempts at self-assertion as rudeness. His sister remains a sour, snobbish cow; his otherwise genteel mother remains obsessed with a certain twelve-letter cuss word. Not even Trudy seems all that fond of him (although, from her viewpoint, he DOES seem like such a priggish, timid jerk...). Anyway, if you're looking for a light, bubbly comedy with a wry grimace, in which the course of love oh so very definitely does not run smoothly, you should enjoy "When Brendan Met Trudy."

The films that come from the BBC seem to offer an endless supply of talent. In this case, Irish author Roddy Doyle has penned a good-hearted, sometimes hilarious tale of Brendan (a rigidly shy teacher who's addicted to movies and who sings, in a beautiful tenor, in the church choir) and Trudy, an outgoing, fun-loving, beautiful young woman who'll see any movie "as long as it's in color." An unlikely pairing, but it works. Trudy slowly draws out the movie "hero" inside Brendan, emancipating him from his previous unfulfilling existence and introducing him to a life of petty crime. It's a movie that takes its opening directly from Sunset Boulevard, and has snippets of dialogue (and clips) from any number of films all the way through--particularly the Jean Seberg, Jean-Paul Belmondo classic, Breathless. In one wonderful scene, the two characters re-enact the Seberg/Belmondo exchange on the street; it's shot at just enough of a distance to mislead the viewer into thinking it's another clip from the original film. Then it breaks out and turns back into its own film.

There's a somewhat unnecessary, even foolish, "what become of" sequence at the end of the film that would've been better left on the cutting room floor. But overall, it's such an entertaining film that it really doesn't matter.
Highly recommended.

For a wonderful, laugh a minute, joy of a tale, watch this film as Brendan gets his first chance at love and his second chance at living. If you haven't read the official review here, avoid it....it's a spoiler. Just see this film! You'll look at love in a whole new way! Everyone in the theatre was HAPPY as can be when they left!

I wish this movie was more available in the US!!! I probably watched it 20 times when living in Dublin. The humor's great and there's references to all sorts of classic movies if you know what you're looking for. DEFINITELY worth watching over...and over...and over again.

I spent my junior year of college in Cork, Ireland. While I was there this movie came out in theaters, and I loved it so much I saw if three times! I have been waiting for it to come to the States since I've returned, and even tried to buy it from amazon.uk only to find that even dvd players are different in Britain. This movie is one of the funniest I've ever seen, and hope that Roddy Doyle continues writing books as well as films!