Dancing at Lughnasa: Movie Review (2009)

Editor's Note: I caught this on cable recently. What follows is the original review, not previously posted here.


Pat O’Connor’s timid yet heartfelt “Dancing at Lughnasa” follows five proud, hard-working Irish women all caught in the throes of quiet desperation.

Based on Brian Friel’s Tony Award-winning play, the film stars Meryl Streep as Kate Mundy, a woman so repressed by her strict Catholic upbringing, she has never truly lived. Neither have her sisters, who all shrink beneath Kate’s formidable, pious presence, until one sister--Christina (Catherine McCormack)--tentatively breaks free.

“Lughnasa” is a film where rage is a character without billing, and humor is an unwelcome stranger that should have been warmly greeted. The play’s power was in its careful balance of heartache and loss underscored with humor, but the film shifts that balance, losing the humor in favor of tense, maudlin moments that sometimes give way to bittersweet poignancy.

The film is slow going, but compensates with lush cinematography, strong writing and an excellent cast spearheaded by Streep, who delivers another deeply realized performance. Whether in a glance or in the most casual of gestures, she has the ability to convey the soul exposed.

“Lughnasa” gives her that opportunity in a film that will have particular appeal to those who follow the works of Frank McCourt and Thomas Wolfe. It finds its heart within the roots of its characters’ despair, yet finds its soul in how these sisters cope with their self-imposed desperation.

Grade: B-