Film slanders fight of the Irish people

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glaring flaw led to a public disownment by Mickey Rourke and director Mike Hodges of their involvement in Rourke, sympathetic to the Irish liberation struggle, visited Northern Ireland and met with members of different groups trying to win Irish independence. He even went so far as to spend time living with a formerly jailed IRA partisan to fully research his role. In the Aug. 22, 1987, issue of The Irish People, Rourke explained his motivation for publicizing the conditions rights of Catholics in north Ireland were being violated, and yet their tragic plight was not adequately documented by the media. The deaths of Bobby Sands and the Hunger Strikers in 1981 reinforced my beliefs...they were men who...protested over 60 years of discrimination and brutality in north Ireland. I visited their graves in Belfast. It was a moving experience...

After the hunger strike, I felt a compelling need of individual acts of violence, it fails miserably to show to tell the world about the tragedy in north the conditions in Northern Ireland which push oppressed people to these extremes. Another aspect of Higgins's After Rourke had signed onto the project, a deal was book that was left out of the film was Fallon's cut with Samuel Goldwyn Company to produce and distribute the film. The result: "I was disappointed and In the book, Fallon, who was raised on a farm by his ashamed [of the film]...Goldwyn took the film away grandfather, visits a cousin in Belfast in August 1969. from the director and recut it himself... Now I think During the visit, a Protestant mob led by the B Specials they just used my name to sell a commercial film that (a government-sanctioned Protestant terrorist group later explains nothing." (Irish America Magazine interview) disbanded and regrouped under another name) attacks the Samuel Goldwyn has gone so far as to slander Mickey Catholic neighborhoods. This real attack, now known as Rourke in the entertainment press for voicing his the "Battle of the Bogside," resulted in the death of 10 dissatisfaction with the film's political message. Catholics and the burning of 200 Catholic homes. Another more mundane flaw was the shallow, Fallon, like many real Catholic youths, took up arms stereotyped female characters. These can be summarized with the IRA men defending the area and "became a as follows: saintly virgin, cold bitch, and hooker-with-aBy leaving out the very real everyday violence and Although "A Prayer for the Dying," a Hollywood discrimination against the Catholics of Northern Ireland, thriller with the backdrop of the Irish struggle, could the film lends itself to the most reactionary have alerted millions to the situation in Northern Ireland, conclusions-even to the point of a general slander the final result was a fairly entertaining film with a against the Irish movement for self-determination. This Alan Bates. Samuel Goldwyn Company.) comrades. the bomb.

United States. himself.

remainder of the film. with the Yugoslavian partisans against Hitler.

any, results.

While the film portrays the pitfalls in Actor Mickey Rourke as the 'hit' man.

motivation to join the IRA. soldier of thẹ Irish Republican Army."

the film. in Northern Ireland:

Ireland..." heart-of-gold.

backward political message.

With this adverse decision by the Court of Appeals, Richard Snedigar, a former FSP member who is suing for the return of money voluntarily donated to the party, is seizing party and personal property to satisfy his demand for $22,500. A Superior Court judge will decide the amount Snedigar should be awarded.

The FSP is asking the appeals court to stay the implementation of the award while the party's further appeals are waiting a hearing.

Expressions of support and money to finance the costly litigation can be sent to Freeway Hall Defense Committee, 5018 Rourke is "ashamed" of film "I became convinced that the human and civil Rainier Avenue South, Seattle, WA 981 18. Thanks again.

Tom Boot, FSP Bay Area organizer, San Francisco, Calif. Pamphlets Dear editor, My subscription ends with the October issue. I am sending you my check so that I don't miss a single issue. I am also enclosing a check for the new Socialist Action pamphlets. Thank you and keep up the excellent work!

Marzia Fiastri, Geneva, Switzerland