MOVIE REVIEW

Veronica Guerin  (2003)

Starring: Cate Blanchett, Colin Farrell, Brenda Fricker
Director: Joel Schumacher

Rating: R

Studio: Touchstone

Release Date: 10.17.03

Review Posted: 10.29.03

Spoilers: None/Minor

By Rachel Sexton

"Veronica Guerin" A Respectable, Deserving Tribute

Stories of real people often captivate moviegoers more than the ones most creative screenwriters come up with. There is a universal appeal in real-life drama. The recent trend in reality shows should tell us that. When the true story is exciting, emotional, and heroic, audiences leave the theater satisfied. Such is the case of Veronica Guerin. A wrenching true story and a flawless lead performance from Cate Blanchett make Veronica Guerin a worthy piece of work.

The real Veronica Guerin wrote for the Sunday Independent in Dublin, Ireland, in the early and mid-‘90s. In 1996, Guerin started investigating the rampant drug problem that had skyrocketed the crime rate. This eventually brought her into opposition with drug lord John Gilligan and on June 26, 1996, she was murdered in her car by his thugs. Mourned as a national hero, Guerin’s death prompted changes in law and public action that Ireland needed to combat the drug problem.

Though Guerin’s life has been made into a film once before (1998’s Once the Sky Falls starring Joan Allen), this film will be more widely seen and I think Guerin’s memory is paid the tribute it deserves.

The film’s narrative begins with the start of the attack that took Guerin’s life, then rewinds to show us how she got there. The early scene in which Guerin first sees the drug-ridden neighborhood is shocking: needles cover the sidewalk and tiny children play with them. (If you don’t feel the way Guerin does after seeing this, I don’t want to know you.) She soon boldly confronts known criminal nasties on her way to the information that will show John Gilligan (Gerard McSorley) is the man behind it all. Her most significant and treacherous source is John Traynor (Ciaran Hinds), a man who wears his black scowl like his black leather coat.

Director Joel Schumacher, last responsible for the effective Phone Booth, has crafted one of his best here, which is saying a lot. Checking his flamboyant tendencies, Schumacher just lets the story unfold and injects stylistic touches where they are most effective. For example, lighting is put to good effect in a tense moment where Guerin is shot in the leg.

Whether you know about Guerin’s story or not, you seem to know that the ending of this film won’t be happy, yet Schumacher doesn’t let a doom pervade the film’s tone. He just builds tension until the first time Guerin and Gilligan meet face to face (resulting in a moment of shocking and unforgettable violence) through to the chilling murder scene.

In this scene’s aftermath, a version of “Athyn Rye” hauntingly plays as Guerin’s co-workers and family learn of her death and the audience cries. The film ends the way it began; with a church service that this time is a funeral procession.

Of the performances, Hinds is solid and McSorley creates a man so thoroughly loathsome I may not be able to stop myself from hitting him if I ever meet him. Also, look for a knockout cameo from Irish native Colin Farrell, who was in Schumacher’s Phone Booth and the excellent Tigerland. This film belongs to Blanchett however, and if she doesn’t receive an Oscar nomination it will be a gross injustice. She doesn’t play the martyr; she creates the martyr as a fully rounded woman who did what only few people would.

Veronica Guerin is an amazing film, as well as inspiring and wrenching at the same time. Cate Blanchett and Joel Schumacher have reason to be proud of the treatment they’ve given to the memory of a modern heroine.

Rating: êêêê1/2  (out of 5)  Grade: A-

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