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“If the price of freedom, if the price of peace, is the blackening of my name, I will gladly pay it.”
Those are the words of Michael Collins as spoken by Liam Neeson. Actually, to put it more accurately, those are the words of Neil Jordan, writer and director of Michael Collins(1996), as spoken by Liam Neeson portraying Michael Collins. It’s the kind of thing Michael Collins may have said but didn’t. And maybe that’s all that matters. History and the movies have always been uncomfortable bedfellows and I have long argued that I don’t care if the history is correct in the movie as long as A) the movie works and B) the history is broadly accurate in spirit. As I wrote here years ago, I’m watching the movie for the entertainment, not the history lesson. If I want to learn the history, I can read about it whenever I want. So when a filmmaker changes certain aspects of history to further dramatize the story, I don’t usually mind as long as no one’s character is being irreparably smeared (see First Officer Murdoch in James Cameron’s Titanic). And, indeed, Jordan does change certain things in his effort to make the fight for Ireland’s independence more accessible to a wider audience without completely rewriting history. He does pick on Eamon de Valera (Alan Rickman) just a little bit by portraying him as a self-centered and jealous leader, a president of the Republic of Ireland who would rather start a civil war than agree to favorable terms he didn’t negotiate (the Anglo-Irish Treaty). In actuality, he believed the terms weren’t favorable and refused to cave on his principles. Michael Collins, on the other hand, both historically and in the movie, felt the treaty, which insured a certain measure of independence for Ireland, was a necessary first step. But does any of this make for a good movie?
There was a short period of time back in the 1990s when Liam Neeson was doing well as a period actor (Schindler’s List [1993], Rob Roy [1995], Ethan Frome [1993]), long before he became known to a younger generation almost exclusively as the guy from the Taken (2008, 2012, 2014) series. During this time, Neeson took on the role of Michael Collins, the Irish patriot who spent his very short life fighting for Irish independence from the British Empire. That role may still be the one most perfectly suited for Neeson’s gifts as an actor and his own physical makeup. While he’s not a dead ringer for Collins, he’s a pretty damn good match, and his acting style, one that has always reminded me of a brawny, quiet man holding back the anger and chaos just under the surface, works perfectly for the young activist and fighter. There’s nary a moment in the movie when the viewer doesn’t feel that Collins might unleash the beast inside. This works marvelously well at making us appreciate just how much restraint Collins is employing in dealing with the British, and de Valera, later on. He hates the empire and would die trying to break Ireland free from it but his love for Ireland also gives him the strength to do what he needs to do when the time comes.
And all of that works, all of the parts that give us an inside feel for Michael Collins himself. What doesn’t work necessarily well is the feeling that Neil Jordan wanted to get as much history as he could into the short time frame his film allotted at the expense of understanding Collins. The scenes don’t feel as though they’ve had time to play out before we’re off to another political debate, committee fight, fiery speech or violent standoff. One could argue that making a film like that is, indeed, in keeping with Collins’s tumultuous and frenetic life, one that ended quite soon when he was shot dead at the age of 31 (yes, Neeson was 44 when he filmed this but still had a young enough face to pull it off). But a movie about Collins should provide more than tumult and we never really get a feel for Collins the young man, and what keeps him moving forward. I’m not saying the basic explanations aren’t there, as in he was an Irish patriot fighting for his rights, I’m saying that we never get a feeling that this is a movie about Collins so much as a dramatic reenactment of the struggle for Ireland’s independence. Fortunately, that still makes for a good period piece and a fairly entertaining film but it could have been so much more.
The performance by Neeson, as stated above, is one of his best and he carries the film while others would make it falter. Julia Roberts, a top star at the time, was brought on board in an attempt to give the movie some added star power. And don’t get me wrong, I think Julia Roberts is a talented actress but she simply doesn’t work here. Her accent is unconvincing on the one hand and her modern cadence and manner is distracting on the other. There are certain actors who work best playing in a contemporary time frame and I think Roberts is one of them. Others in the cast, like Aidan Quinn as Harry Boland, do well but don’t have much to do except respond to whatever Collins or de Valera say, never feeling like anything more than a standard foil, first to de Valera, then to Collins. Stephen Rea gives a deliberate understated performance as Ned Broy but, again, seems less a character than a historical reenactment and finally, Alan Rickman, one of the most talented actors of the 1990s and beyond, plays de Valera a bit… too much. Neil Jordan said that he nixed many Irish actors that he felt were playing caricatures of de Valera rather than a real person but Rickman feels exactly the same way. He doesn’t feel like de Valera, he feels like Alan Rickman carefully saying each word to look and sound like de Valera. It is unfortunate that such an important character in the movie feels distracting every time he is on the screen.
Still, I’d recommend it. I’d recommend it as a starter guide to a very compelling period in the history of Ireland, one that has interested me for years, perhaps because of my grandmother, Nellie Frances Keenan, and my father’s constant reminder that just because we had an Italian last name, we shouldn’t ignore our Irish roots. But mainly I’d recommend it to see Liam Neeson give an energetic and powerful performance as Collins himself. Sometimes, a powerful performance is all you need.
Greg Ferrara
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