The Playboys

Rarely have I taken note of music more deleterious to a film’s success, more like soap opera schmaltz than Celtic liveliness. Robin Wright (pre-Penn) does imbue the film with more liveliness than it otherwise demonstrates. Albert Finney and Aidan Quinn are more than adequate in stereotyped roles. There is a definite feel of authenticity to the portrayal of a village in 1957 Ireland, less cuteness than there might be in Gillies MacKinnon’s direction of a Shane Connaughton script, but it ultimately seems formulaic and inconclusive. Robin is the wild girl, pregnant by an unknown man, who upsets the balance of the staid little village. Finney is the imposing Garda sergeant, who is trying to reform his drinking to win her hand. Quinn blows into town with a travelling troupe of vaudeville players led by faux-Shakespearian Milo O’Shea, in a last gasp before the “wireless with pictures” takes over village entertainment. You can fill in the rest. (1992, dvd, r.) *5+*