Film

Movie theaters, reviews and showtimes in New York, plus articles, trailers and more
 

The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne (1987)

Director: Jack Clayton

Average user rating
No reviews

Movie review

From Time Out Film Guide

Brian Moore's novel makes for a depressing experience in Clayton's hands. Everything seems congealed in a time warp, and if the forlorn, shabby-genteel dreams of a Dublin boarding-house conjure up the feeling of '40s Rattigan, the treatment could be a late '50s Room at the Bottom. Judith Hearne's lonely passion is for being loved, and failing that, the hard stuff. Neither of her amulets - a photo of her late aunt and a picture of The Lord - can save her from the bottle, and she regularly loses her piano students and her lodgings. It's a hermetic story in which hope springs eternal despite the treadmill of character, and Maggie Smith calibrates her suffering to a nicety, rising to ferocious anguish before an uncommunicative altar shrine. The landlady's brother, James Madden (Hoskins), returned from the States and full of bull, appears to be a romantic contender, but is only interested in her putative savings. The landlady's lecherous son (McNeice) is grotesque beyond the call of duty. A downer.

Author: BC 0000-00-00 00:00:00

Time Out Film Guide

  • Print this page
  • Send to a friend

What do you think?
Post your review now

clear rating
Min 1 star. Zero stars will be treated as unrated.

*mandatory fields


Cast & crew

Director: Jack Clayton

Producer: Peter Nelson, Richard Johnson

Cast: Maggie Smith, Bob Hoskins, Wendy Hiller, Marie Kean, Ian McNeice, Alan Devlin, Rudi Davies, Prunella Scales, Sheila Reid full cast

Duration: 116 mins


Features

Making a name for himself

Making a name for himself

Sin Nombre's Cary Joji Fukunaga learned his lessons well.

To the letter

Forty years later, Costa-Gavras's Z still brims with fury.

Mind over matter

David Cronenberg reflects on a most bizarre body: his own corpus of work.

Fool's gold

Can an Oscar win lead to a cursed career? Here are five stories of postaward professional meltdowns.

We are the championed

Terrorists and teens abound in this year's "Film Comment Selects."

A history of violence

Matteo Garrone's kaleidoscopic Gomorrah wallops you with Italy's crime crisis.

True romantic

James Gray exchanges urban amorality for amour in Two Lovers.

Playing in the dark

MoMA salutes pianist Stuart Oderman's 50 years as the one-man sound of silents.

Junk bonds

Cast and crew recall the making of the classic NYC drug drama The Panic in Needle Park.