Irish in Ireland AMA

[SrSteveOskowski]

Following on from a Dane in Denmark, I'm Irish, living in Ireland AMA

I never thought a movie about pregnancy from a rape was very funny.

What?! Pat Mustard has died?

The high point of my teenage disco experience was when Ray D'Arcy himself came to DJ in our small town.

mineallmine, we must have gone to the same school, unless Gabriel Byrne did a whistle stop tour of lots of Irish schools.

Lookit

choli I agree, it's horrible how that's just glossed over as if it's a joke. I hate that film.

I loved The Snapper when it came out (I was about 14 I think), it was only when I saw it 20 years later that I thought 'holy fuck'.There was a stage version in The Gate last year that got rave reviews. I'd be interested to know how they approached that scene seeing as there's been a huge cultural shift between then and now.

I loathed The Snapper too. Imagine you're a middle aged man walking home and your neighbour's 19 year old daughter - and your own daughter's friend - is staggering towards you blind drunk, reaching her arms out to you. Do you (a) make sure she gets home safely or (b) rape her over the bonnet of a car, resulting in a pregnancy which is all just completely highlarious?

FFS! Apart from anything else, in a real 1980s working class community, (I grew up in one) Georgie Burgess would have been beaten to within an inch of his life. No one would find it funny. I can't stand Roddy Doyle's broad brush caricatures, he's a fucking terrible writer and has a tin ear for the people he depicts. Patronising bastard.

And the way nobody considered it rape, including the victim.

If I’m remembering it right, I think Sharon ‘wonders’ once in the novel whether it could be considered rape, but it’s then just dropped. The film doesn’t even let it cross anyone’s mind.

That said, I love George Burgess’s letter. ‘PS. The paper is my sister’s.’

I was around Sharon's age when it came out and it bothered me then. I don't think a woman would have written it.

I think it was exceptional writing as it depicted exactly how such situations were dealt with at the time. It was never meant to be a moral piece. It was very fucking risky to tell it like it was. For very many people, it was very typical of how it was. A writer doesn't need to airbrush. A good writer will write about 'the way things were'. Hollywood is a different story.

It was a very disturbing piece of film (never read the book). Not sure who directed it. But I genuinely feel it was exemplary of the society it was trying to depict. Dark, as a lot of hidden secrets in Irish society have been. But loving in other ways. Humorous. I actually think it was a work of art.

I've read his other books though. They're quick reads. In film form they make more of an impact.

One scene from it that I recall is her in bed, having visions/nightmares of 'are you alright Sharon?' It was one fucked up movie, but it really went into the ugly deep of Irish society at the time. It's a past we'd love to forget about surely, but putting a comedic element to it allowed it to be discussed. I think you're silly if you discount his work as it makes for uncomfortable viewing.

Tanya
Far from the filming declaring it not rape, it's pretty clear it was.

If I’m remembering it right, I think Sharon ‘wonders’ once in the novel whether it could be considered rape, but it’s then just dropped. The film doesn’t even let it cross anyone’s mind

That was how rape was dealt with in Irish society. Uncomfortable truth?

The fact that it crossed everyone's mind as a viewer, was exactly what the director intended.

Everyone knew it was rape, but it was denied and brushed under the carpet.
That's how we operated then.

Was The Snapper book the one with the dad timing the kids on bikes with a stopwatch they got from collecting tokens from Calvita cheese?

Remember Calvita and Galtee plastic cheese? Do they still make them?

At the time I think the main theme was the family, the dad in particular, accepting and supporting their daughter. The process the father went though to get to the point of acceptance and him becoming a better person because of it.

It wasn’t taken for granted back then that your family would support you if you had an unplanned pregnancy, not by a long shot. Married man as the father? Jaysis you’re pushing it now. How many of the women in the Magdalen laundries had been raped? Many, many of them. Tough luck, it’s still your life that’s over, not his.

A depiction of a family rallying around was quite progressive at the time, sad as that is.

The Roddy Doyle adaptation that stopped me in my tracks was The Family. At first you're presented with this bloke (Charlo?) who's a bit of a wastrel but cheeky and charming with it. And you're smiling along with him. And then suddenly the mood changes and his true nature is revealed and it's deeply unsettling. I remember finding it so dark and so shocking. Again I was a teen at the time. I haven't seen that since it was broadcast on telly.

A book of Doyle's I really enjoyed was one of his kids' books called A Greyhound of a Girl. Quite simple but deals with loss and grief in a lovely way.

No need to call me "silly" for having a different response to the film than you. I don't really credit Roddy Doyle with the subtlety to be making points about the dark side of Irish society in The Snapper; he's just a man who doesn't understand women's lives and doesn't write them very well.

jane yes! Stephen Roche has a lot to answer for 😂

Remember Calvita and Galtee plastic cheese? Do they still make them

These were a staple. I hated cheese as a kid ... I was pretty much reared when I realised I'd never tasted actual cheese.

I used to love a slice of orange plasticky Calvita on a buttered Digestive back in the day.