Irish filmmakers Terry George and Jim Sheridan like to say that ” `Father’ gave birth to `Mother.’ ” What they mean is that the success of “In the Name of the Father,” directed by Sheridan from a screenplay they co-wrote, made it possible for George to direct “Some Mother’s Son.”
Because George, 42, had never made a movie before, Sheridan, who also directed “My Left Foot,” was an unofficial backup. Sheridan, 47, is listed as producer and co-writer of “Some Mother’s Son,” though he acknowledges that most of the script was done by his colleague.
“There was no contract saying if I flopped Jim would direct it, but I suppose that was in their mind,” George acknowledges.
Like their first collaboration, “Some Mother’s Son” is about the struggle between the Irish and the British over Northern Ireland. The film, which opened Dec. 26, is the second about the Irish troubles to come out this season–“Michael Collins,” which proved to be a box-office disappointment, told the story of an early Irish freedom fighter and looked at the roots of Irish revolutionary groups like the Irish Republican Army.
The new film is based on the 1981 hunger strike by 16 IRA members who had been jailed by the British in the notorious Ulster prison known as the Maze. They were attempting to gain political-prisoner status from the British government, which considered them criminals. One of the prisoners, Bobby Sands, was elected to Parliament while on the hunger strike but died in prison, along with nine other hunger strikers.
“Some Mother’s Son” is told from the point of view of the mothers who had to decide whether to let their sons starve or sign a release for them to be force-fed.
“It’s my perspective on how parents stand on the sidewalk and wave their sons off to war and then they’re supposed to wait with dignity in airports for their coffins to come back,” says George, who has a personal connection to the story–in his 20s he served three years in the Maze for possession of weapons. “This was a unique occasion when the parents of these prisoners were asked to get involved in the last great struggle of their lives.
“It is a drama of Shakespearean proportions and at the same time an intimate story and a story that could have a wide application to life.”
His movie focuses on two of the mothers, played by Helen Mirren and Fionnula Flanagan, and their agony over what to do. Mirren was instrumental in getting “Some Mother’s Son” made. She brought the script to Castle Rock. The studio had wanted to work with her and agreed to finance it.
Though the situation in the film is “absolutely true,” George says, the two mothers are fictional.
“I quite specifically avoided the families and the idea of choosing among them the two who had the most dramatic story. First of all there is no one story in those 16 families that encompasses the whole thing, so I had to pick compilations of each in order to get the story drawn. And it was too macabre and pathetic to go around to the families and say, `I want the rights to your story because it is better than another story.’ “
The filmmakers haven’t heard from the parents and don’t know how many of them have seen “Some Mother’s Son.” “Anybody who had a child die, it’s so traumatic, I think they probably wouldn’t want to see the film,” Sheridan says.
George was in the Maze at the same time as some of the prisoners involved in the hunger strike, including Sands, whom he met. It is a part of his life that he has been reluctant to talk about in the past “because it could have ramifications for people I know in the community and for my family,” he explains.
The British newspapers uncovered his prison record in 1994 during the controversy over “In the Name of the Father,” which many British felt distorted the facts.
“British journalism is very much the journalism of blame,” George says. “They want to rip your soul out and bare your guts. I made a film–it’s not as though I went to confession and said, `I’m going to expose my life.’ “
Now that the information is out, however, George talks about it openly. When he was growing up in West Belfast, most of his community was in rebellion against the British army, which was on the streets in force.
“Most of the people in my generation were involved politically,” he recalls. “I was involved in a faction of the IRA that came and disappeared. They happened to be carrying these firearms, and I was arrested.”
At the core of “Some Mother’s Son” is the effect the hunger strike had on the families of the young men. Mirren’s character had kept her distance from the Irish rebellion before her son’s arrest and was at a loss to know how to respond to it.
George’s own mother responded much as Mirren does in the movie. “There was sadness, pain, resignation,” he says. “She visited and sent food parcels, but she really didn’t know what to do.”
His six-year sentence was cut in half. “I wasn’t a troublemaker,” he recalls.
“I wouldn’t say that my time there was a holiday, but it gave me perspective on my life. I came out feeling, `Thank God that’s over.’ “
Some of his experience there got into “Some Mother’s Son.” “But more of what I put in the movie is that arrogance of youth–how you do things when you are young without taking into consideration the effect on everyone around you.”
Because of his imprisonment, his family was driven out of the house he grew up in. “It had a huge impact on everybody around me.”
George says he is no longer affiliated with any Irish revolutionary organizations and has stepped back from political activity. “You sort of quietly make a decision to protect yourself and the people you love instead of throwing yourself in the range of the truck. I learned that from hard experience and being in jail and seeing people killed on the streets.”
Before his first script was accepted, George wrote freelance magazine articles and unloaded trucks to support his family. His wife, Rita Higgins, is an advice columnist for an Irish newspaper. They have homes in Ireland and New York.
Both he and Sheridan are taking a break from Irish political movies. Sheridan got a lot of offers from Hollywood after “In the Name of the Father” received several Oscar nominations. “I suppose they were throwing a lot of money at me,” he says. “They missed,” George adds. Next up for Sheridan: a modern film about a boxer.
George is working on a screenplay about a New York subway cop who gets into trouble every time he goes above ground. “It’s a tragic comedy that has a romance,” he says.
