Film
What's on at the cinema plus reviews of the latest movie and DVD releases
Bookmark this pageWhen the Sky Falls (1999)
Director: John MacKenzie
Movie review
From Time Out Film Guide
How do you sell the real-life story of journalist Victoria Guerin (here renamed Sinead Hamilton), killed for speaking out against Dublin's drug barons? As with Erin Brockovich, a feisty mother juggles a dangerous crusade with the demands of family life, but where Erin's enemies were anonymous businessmen, Sinead's are rough and ruined hustlers. Erin's victims were in the dark about the poison entering their blood, but Sinead's have a choice. John (The Long Good Friday) MacKenzie would seem well placed to appreciate such muddy details. For much of the time he does well, treating Sinead (Allen) not as a heroine, but as an ordinary complex individual. She enjoys a charged relationship with one of her sources, Mickey (Smallhorne). Does he provide some sort of sexuality - raciness - lacking in her life, or is that just what she wants him to think? As in Nixon and The Ice Storm, Allen's disheartened eyes keep her secrets locked tight. The Dublin police with whom she joins forces, meanwhile, are incompetent and occasionally vicious, with the most shocking scene saved for the murder of a drug addict forced to act as a mole. It's all the stranger then, that elsewhere the film plays like a dreary TV movie.Author: CO'Su
Cast & crew
Director: John MacKenzie
Producer: Nigel Warren-Green, Michael Wearing
Cast: Joan Allen, Patrick Bergin, Liam Cunningham, Kevin McNally, Jimmy Smallhorne, Gerard Flynn, Jason Barry, Pete Postlethwaite, Des McAleer, Owen Roe full cast
Duration: 107 mins
Most popular on this site
Top Stories
Has David Cronenberg turned tame?
Has director David Cronenberg veered too far from his radical and bloody roots with new film 'A Dangerous Method'?
Pop-up cinema for Valentine's Day
Side-step romantic clichés with some alternative Valentine’s viewing
The 10 worst date movies
Just in time for Valentine's Day, we present ten of the least romantic films ever made
Where to watch this year's Oscar-nominated films
Find out where to watch 2012's Oscar-nominated films in London cinemas
10 unlikely badboy biopics
Featuring Phil Collins, Jeremy Clarkson, Nick Clegg, David Starkey and a host of other unlikely subjects
What do you think?
Post your review now