Rent White Irish Drinkers (2010)

White Irish Drinkers review by Alyse Garner - Cinema Paradiso

From one of the names behind the hit supernatural series Ghost Whisperer comes this difficult crime drama about the lives and dreams of two brothers desperate to escape the poverty stricken and violence riddled city of Brooklyn.

Writer/director John Gray uses his own upbringing to set the tone for this story of two brothers with the Rolling Stones and a box office heist at its heart. Though it is not an easy film to watch White Irish Drinkers offers an interesting insight into its subject matter and some truly impressive and expressive performances from all key members of cast.

Brothers Danny and Brian live under the shadow of their violent longshoreman father and are both desperately looking for ways to escape – Brian the painter and hopeful film maker takes a job at a movie theatre whilst his brother Danny finds himself involved with the Irish-American criminal underworld.

The plot centres around the fateful night when Brian’s employer Whitey calls in a favour and convinces the Rolling Stones to play a short set at his theatre before putting on a huge performance at Madison Square Gardens. Though this aspect of the story has a distinct ring of liberal rock and roll comedy the overall feeling of the movie couldn’t be further from the truth.

White Irish Drinkers is a rather dark semi auto biographical tale of the struggle of the lower classes in New York in the mid 70’s littered with the sporadic depiction of some of the small joys offered in such a life.