Product Details

• Actors: Gerard McSorley, Meryl Streep, Michael Gambon, Catherine McCormack, Kathy Burke
• Directors: Pat O'Connor
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, Dolby, NTSC
• Language: English
• Rating: PG (Parental Guidance Suggested)
• Number of tapes: 1
• Studio: Sony Pictures
• VHS Release Date: May 24, 1999
• Run Time: 94 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (38 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B00000IMKX
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #16,925 in Video (See Bestsellers in Video)

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  Video > Drama > Family Life > Brothers & Sisters

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com
This affecting, bittersweet tale--adapted from Brian Friel's semi-autobiographical Tony Award-winning play--examines the emotional lives of the five unmarried Mundy sisters in 1936 rural Ireland. In their mutual care is 8-year-old Michael (sweetly understated Darrell Johnston), the illegitimate son of youngest sister Christina (Braveheart's Catherine McCormack). A voice-over from the adult Michael recalls that significant summer, in the month of August, during the feast of Lughnasa. The bolder townfolk dance around a fire to Lugh, an ancient god of light. Yes, this is fiercely Roman Catholic Ireland and Lugh a pagan god, but that irony is at the core of the film, the hypocrisy of tradition. The dramatic change in the richly metaphoric movie comes with the arrival of two men: eldest sibling--and only Mundy brother--Jack (Michael Gambon), a priest returning from many years in Africa, now addled, and Christine's long-absent lover and Michael's father, the charmingly flighty Gerry (Rhys Ifans). Beautiful music and excellent performances highlight the film, which also features gorgeous cinematography of the Irish countryside. Meryl Streep is stern eldest sister Kate; Kathy Burke is lively Maggie; Brid Brennan (who appeared in the stage play) is thoughtful caretaker Agnes; and Sophie Thompson is simple sweet Rose. It's a quiet film, but one filled with ironic and haunting meaning. Directed by Pat O'Connor (Circle of Friends). --N.F. Mendoza

From The New Yorker
Pat O'Connor's film version of Brian Friel's play rattles the bars of a lyrical, well-made work but doesn't burst through them, and in the end one is let down. Meryl Streep stars as the smartest and most thoroughly defeated of the five unmarried Mundy sisters living on a farm in Donegal, Ireland, in the thirties; Michael Gambon, too much becalmed, is the brother who returns from Africa in thrall to the rituals and freedoms of a non-Christian culture. The movie is wistful and touching but not much more. With Kathy Burke, Brid Brennan, Sophie Thompson, and Catherine McCormack. Frank McGuinness did the adaptation. -David Denby
Copyright © 2006 The New Yorker

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "Dancing as if language no longer existed.", September 15, 2004

By	Mary Whipple (New England) - See all my reviews (TOP 50 REVIEWER)    (COMMUNITY FORUM 04)

Directed by Pat O'Connor and exquisitely filmed (by Kenneth MacMillan) in the countryside of Donegal, this ensemble drama is adapted from the stage play by Brian Friel. Screenwriter Frank McGuinness sticks close to the dialogue of the play but opens up the rural cottage setting to include brief scenes of the town of Ballybeg, the stunning and untamed countryside, and the pagan harvest celebration, the Feast of Lughnasa. Set in 1936, the film focuses on the difficult lives of five unmarried sisters and an eight-year-old love child, when Ireland was on the verge of World War II and industrialization. The film stresses character and theme, rather than plot, highlighting the relationships among the sisters as they cope with the arrival of their brother, a priest returning from Uganda after twenty-five years, and the summer-long visit of Gerry Evans, father of Christina's child, Michael.

Kate (Meryl Streep), the sister who is "in charge," is the only real wage earner in the family. Rigid, severe, and lacking in humor, she believes pagan celebrations, such as the Feast of Lughnasa, which still provide fun and enjoyment in the countryside, are "uncivilized." Her priest brother (sensitively played by Michael Gambon), however, is now virtually a pagan himself. Though he is clearly unbalanced, he has learned the need of the poor for happiness, dancing, and community celebration, even if it is not church-sanctioned.

The other Mundy sisters help illustrate the chasm between Kate's attitudes and those of Fr. Jack. Maggie (Kathy Burke), the fun-loving, free-spirited, and most humorous of the sisters, constantly bursts into singing and dancing. Christina has fun during the summer with lover Gerry Evans but feels no need to marry him. Aggie (Brid Brennan) and Rose (Sophie Thompson), who earn small wages knitting gloves, work as the family's sad, "unpaid servants," and constantly chafe against Kate's strictures and the lack of fun. When Kate loses her job, the family is devastated, but it is at that moment that they discover the joy of dancing and recognize the need to celebrate life itself.

The dramatic opening with its photographs of African celebrations sets the tone for the film, and the music, sometimes featuring traditional Celtic instruments (accordian, fiddle, and bodhran), suggests common pagan roots. The cinematography is stunning, and the cast is as good as it gets. As is sometimes characteristic of plays converted to film, the dialogue is a bit exaggerated, as it has to be on stage, where close-ups and subtle gestures are not possible, and Streep's role is especially extreme, but the film is beautifully realized, and its thematic development is sensitive and memorable. Mary Whipple

17 of 19 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars One Irish summer, April 9, 2004

By	Kona (Emerald City) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

A man fondly recalls the summer of 1936, when he was eight years old in this Irish slice-of-life drama. Young Michael lives with his unmarried mother and her four spinster sisters, including Kate (Meryl Streep). The women make a meager living by knitting gloves, until a knitting factory opens nearby. Into their quiet and ordered lives comes their older brother, a priest who spent his life in Africa and has suffered a kind of breakdown, and Michael's long-unseen father, an adventurer who's on his way to fight against Franco.

This is a very quiet and slow-paced film. It succeeds in capturing the lifestyle, character, and beauty of the Irish countryside, when all that mattered was your family and church. There is very little action - a motor cycle ride, listening to the radio, and on one special night, dancing in the yard - but that makes the film even more poignant. Based on an autobiographical play, Dancing at Lughnasa is a raw, no-frills look back in time, with an art-house-film feel. Fans of Meryl Streep will enjoy her fine performance as the strict and melancholy eldest sister. Michael Gambon gives a sympathetic performance as the confused priest who has come home to die.

9 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Sensitive, brainy, emotional cinematic masterpiece., January 3, 2001

By	BVT (Paranaque City Philippines) - See all my reviews

The story of the Mundy family of five sisters, a mentally disoriented brother, and a growing up boy would have been mundane and sleepy if poorly directed and mediocrelly cinematographed. This is not the case here. This is a beautifully done movie. The phasing is slow to heighten the ambience of the rural Irish countryside. It's like being thrown to that mid-30's era in rural Europe, far from the madding war drums. The acting by everone is top notch.