Donal McCann Movies

Actor John Turturro, who made his directorial debut with the Cannes Camera d'Or winner Mac (1992), returned to directing with this period farce about a struggling, turn-of-the-century New York repertory company owned by Astergourd (Beverly D'Angelo) and Pallenchio (Donal McCann). Egotistical playwright Tuccio (Turturro) has written a new play, Illuminata, for the troupe's actress-manager Rachel (Katherine Borowitz), daughter of aging actor Flavio (Ben Gazzara), who's lost his memory. Tuccio would like to see Illuminata staged, but the owners feel the play is unfinished. Young Piero (Matthew Sussman) collapses while performing in Cavalleria Rusticana, and this provides the ambitious Tuccio with an opportunity to introduce his new work to audiences. Unfortunately, foppish critic Bevalaqua (Christopher Walken) is unimpressed and issues a vicious attack on the production -- while also making unsubtle overtures to company clown Marco (Bill Irwin). Diva Celimene (Susan Sarandon) seduces Tuccio with her promises to bring him worldwide fame and fortune. Other liaisons are played out with the juvenile leads (Rufus Sewell, Georgina Cates), a veteran clown (Leo Bassi), and a supporting actress (Aida Turturro). Shown in competition at the 1998 Cannes Film Festival. ~ Bhob Stewart, All Movie Guide

This beautiful if ponderous soufflé of a film from director Bernardo Bertolucci serves more as an Italian travelogue than a drama. Liv Tyler stars as Lucy Harmon, an American teenager arriving in the lush Tuscan countryside to visit family friends residing there. Lucy visited four years earlier and exchanged a kiss with a handsome boy with whom she hopes to become reacquainted. Lucy's mother has committed suicide since then, and the teenager also hopes to discover the identity of her father, whom her mother hinted was a resident of the villa. Once she arrives, Lucy meets a variety of eccentric visitors, including a dying gay playwright (Jeremy Irons), a sculptor (Donal McCann), an entertainment lawyer (D.W. Moffet), and several others. Lucy has decided to lose her virginity and becomes an object of intense interest to the men of the household, but the suitor she finally selects is not the initial object of her affection. Stealing Beauty boasted an intriguing parallel between actress Tyler's role and her real life. The daughter of a famed rock and roll star, she was brought up believing that her father was someone else, a fact that Bertolucci may have had in mind when writing the story. ~ Karl Williams, All Movie Guide

A young, priest falls irredeemably from grace in this Irish drama that is comprised of two films put together. He is defrocked and sent to a home for troubled priests. There he meets a bishop who has come home after being exiled to remote missions overseas after he too stumbled and fell. The younger priest, an alcoholic child-molester, encourages him to tell his story. When the bishop was but a young pastor himself and stationed on a lonely island, he was confronted with a suicidal lass whom he took into his household as a servant and later into his bed as a secret lover. They were quite happy until they realized that she was pregnant. He then confessed his actions to his parishioners; the ensuing scandal caused the girl to flee the island, and he lost his parish. Later he was promoted to bishop. Much of the bishop's downfall was filmed silently in sepia-tones; his present-day story was filmed in black and white with dialogue. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

In 1846, a group of over eighty Westward-bound pioneers were headed to the coast of California from Illinois, which had itself only recently been brought up to "civilized" status. They made it to a pass high in the Sierra Nevada mountains of California when they were halted by a truly monstrous blizzard, followed by the snows of one of the worst winters in that century. Their attempts to go forward and backward were thwarted by the deep snow, and, in the small shelter they enjoyed, they slowly starved to death. Eventually, they resorted to cannibalism to survive, and after their story became more widely known, the pass they took shelter in became known as "the Donner Pass." To this day, it is frequently made impassable by heavy snows. Ironically, the forty or so who survived later discovered that, had they only forged ahead about a hundred yards, they would have won free of the deep snow which ensnared them. This documentary has gathered a surprising harvest of photos, notes and drawings in order to tell the pioneers' story. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

Director Mike Beckham draws on the facts in the case of two 1974 bomb attacks in Birmingham that left twenty-one dead, and six innocent men wrongly convicted. When terrorists bomb two Birmingham pubs, the authorities race to catch the culprits responsible for killing twenty-one unsuspecting civilians. But were the men christened the "Birmingham Six" really the ones responsible for this horrific mass slaughter? In this film, Beckham follows the efforts of World in Action researchers Ian MacBride and Chris Mullin in proving that the "Birmingham Six" only admitted to the bombing under extreme duress, and that the five IRA agents were in fact responsible for the deadly attacks. ~ Jason Buchanan, All Movie Guide

The owner of an Irish castle decides to attract visitors by falsely claiming that the building is haunted, only to have a pair of real ancestral spirits start causing trouble in this uneven attempt at fantasy-comedy. The story centers on Jack and Sharon (played by Steve Guttenberg and Beverly D'Angelo), naive American tourists who are initially unimpressed by the owner's attempts at fraud but become more interested in the real ghosts, Mary and Martin (played by Daryl Hannah and Liam Neeson). This is especially true for Jack, who falls in love with the beautiful Mary, despite several centuries' difference in their ages. After the film's initial unsuccessful release, people involved with the production blamed studio interference for damaging director Neil Jordan's original vision, although Jordan is better known as a director of quirky, dark dramas (Mona Lisa, The Crying Game, Interview With a Vampire, The Company of Wolves). For whatever reason, the end result was an awkward, forced comedy that more often than not falls flat, squandering a strong collection of talent. ~ Judd Blaise, All Movie Guide

In this thoughtful black-and-white drama, the story of a priest living and working on Clare Island in County Mayo, Ireland is shown. Except for his vocation, he is a fairly normal fellow, so when a lovely woman is fished out of the sea and delivered into his care, he can't help but notice that she's easy to look at. Eventually she becomes his housekeeper, and before too long she is his mistress. Soon, she is visibly pregnant, and the priest must explain to his tolerant parishioners what has been going on. However, he must also explain the same events to his considerably less-understanding bishop. The way he chooses to do this is to write a novel about the whole thing. The ensuing publicity upsets the bishop even more than the events themselves, and throughout the film the bishop is seen writing his response to this errant shepherd. ~ Clarke Fountain, All Movie Guide

Out of Africa is drawn from the life and writings of Danish author Isak Dinesen, who during the time that the film's events occured was known by her married name, Karen Blixen-Flecke. For convenience's sake, Karen (Meryl Streep) has married Baron Bor Blixen-Flecke (Klaus Maria Brandauer). In 1914, the Baron moves himself and his wife to a plantation in Nairobi, then leaves Karen to her own devices as he returns to his womanizing and drinking. Soon, Karen has fallen in love with charming white hunter Denys Finch Hatton (Robert Redford), who prefers a no-strings relationship. A woman who prides herself on her independence, Blixen finds herself unhappily in thrall to a aloof man -- and doubly unhappy for living out such a cliché situation. Although Redford received a lion's share of criticism for his too-American performance, Streep has rarely been better, and the film's perfectly measured pace is offset by David Watkin's stunning location photography. The movie was nominated for 11 Academy Awards and won 7, including Best Picture, Best Director for Sydney Pollack, Best Adapted Screenplay for Kurt Luedtke, and Best Cinematography for Watkin. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

William Masters (Gabriel Byrne), an aloof and analytical young man studying the life of Sir Isaac Newton, takes up residence in a cottage on a family estate and then becomes involved with the family's own troubles. Masters is secretly enamored of the lady of the house who is burdened with an alcoholic husband, but he has an affair with her niece. This is a prescription for disaster, especially given the young man's tendency to strait-jacket his feelings. Director Kevin Billington has also used an aloof and analytical approach to the story, as a reflection of Masters' own perspective -- yet that treatment does not effectively bring out the psychological turmoil that underlies the restrained behavior of the protagonists -- and distances the audience as well. ~ Eleanor Mannikka, All Movie Guide

Writer/director Neil Jordan's debut feature is a tense thriller played out amid the violence in Northern Ireland. Stephen Rea stars as Danny, a saxophone player in a traveling band who witnesses the brutal murders of the manager of the band (who is involved in some extortion payoffs) and a deaf and dumb girl, who has seen the killing of the manager. After observing these cold-blooded executions, Danny becomes obsessed with hunting down the killers. His obsession develops into a murderous rage so intense that he ends up becoming as heartless a killer as the people he is trying to find. ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

Impoverished Irish moonshiners are the focus of this gritty, bleak drama, allegedly the first motion picture ever shot in Gaelic. Director Bob Quinn reportedly created the work in response to what he perceived as cultural myths propagated by John Ford's movie The Quiet Man (1952) -- some 27 years after that film's production. The title is Gaelic for "moonshine"; Cyril Cusack stars as an unnamed 'poteen-maker' (or whiskey brewer) who distills his fiery liquid near his bayside home, where he lives with his daughter. The premise concerns two ne'er-do-wells who run headfirst into problems with both the law and with Cusack's character. Whatever one's feelings about this picture, its searing and pessimistic view of the Irish is overwhelming. Indeed, Poitin received much criticism for its portrayal of the Irish as no-good, ignorant, bottle-prone louts. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

After she's attacked while travelling abroad, a woman becomes extremely suspicious of every male she encounters. When she finds out that her attacker has not been caught, she is sure that her attacker intends to return. ~ All Movie Guide