The Outsider (1979 film)
1979 British film by Tony Luraschi
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The Outsider is a 1979 film thriller set largely in Belfast during The Troubles; it was the first film directed by Italian-American Tony Luraschi. The film is based on the book The Heritage of Michael Flaherty by Colin Leinster, and details the fictional experience of an idealistic Irish-American who travels to Ireland and joins the IRA in the 1970s.
by Colin Leinster[1]
| The Outsider | |
|---|---|
| |
| Directed by | Tony Luraschi |
| Based on | The Heritage of Michael Flaherty by Colin Leinster[1] |
| Produced by | Cinematic Arts B.V.,[2] Philippe Modave (executive)[3] |
| Starring | Craig Wasson Sterling Hayden Patricia Quinn Niall O'Brien |
| Music by | Ken Thorne |
Production company | |
| Distributed by | Cinema International Corporation (UK)[4][5] |
Release date |
|
Running time | 128 minutes[8] |
| Language | English |
Production
Luraschi, who had worked as an assistant director with Stanley Kramer and Roger Vadim, had never been to Ireland until 1976.[9] The company was unable to film in Northern Ireland, so instead made arrangement with a local residents' association to film the exterior scenes in the Dublin suburb of Ringsend.[4][10][11]
Release
Despite the distributor's hope, the film was rejected by the 1979 London Film Festival.[2][5] It opened at The Gate 2 cinema in Bloomsbury, London on 29 November 1979 during the festival.[5]
Reception
The film caused a minor scandal where government officials were outraged at a scene that showed a British officer participating in the torture of a partially blind Irish Catholic prisoner.[9][5]
New York magazine praised the direction "his skill at realistically conveying the terrible waste of the civil strife in Northern Ireland and the chilling day-to-day acceptance of violence as a way of life there. Unfortunately, the red-herring contrivances of his plot trivialize his powerful material."[9]
Stepan O'Fetchit said "At the other extreme, modern-dress movies like Tony Luraschi's The Outsider... purport to present a real, contemporary Ireland while effectively reducing it to a traffic snarl-up of faceless ideologues wielding guns, balaclavas, and gritty one-liners."[12]
Variety called it a "thoughtful terrorism drama" but felt that the "lack of concession on the part of director-scripter Tony Luraschi to conventional thriller pacing makes the Paramount-financed production no easy moneyspinner."[13]