BELFAST

Stars: Jude Hill, Jamie Dornan, Catriona Balfe, Ciaran Hinds, Lewis McCaskie, Lara McDonnell and Judi Dench.
Writer/Director: Kenneth Branagh.

Rating: ★ ★ ½

Director Kenneth Branagh claims that his latest work is a recollection of moments from his life as a wee lad on the streets of late 60s Belfast. Sectarian conflict is on the rise; Catholic and Protestant rioters are tearing apart the terrace homes and small businesses of the poor working class communities. Barbed wire and curfews and late night patrols are altering the fabric of tight-knit pockets of friends and family.

And ‘family’ is what Branagh wants you to believe his film is really all about. The strapping father (Jamie Dornan) who heads off every week to London to find work; the stoic mum (Outlander star Catriona Balfe), who is slowly unravelling as she tries to raise two boys and run a household by herself; and the wise old grandparents (Ciaran Hinds and Dame Judi Dench), who are good for a cuppa and some wisdom when called upon.

We experience this world through the eyes of an adorable innocent named Buddy (Jude Hill), who is going through all the torment one must as a 10 y.o. 1969 Belfast - getting the cute classmate to notice you; struggling with the fire-and-brimstone message of the local pastor; facing off against Catholic rioters; dealing with a family dynamic that is clearly strained.

It’s a bit insufferable that Kenneth Branagh recalls himself as such a perfectly lovable little boy, but inflated self-perception has never been a problem for Branagh. And that bloated sense of one’s own worth courses through Belfast, which wants to be a loving ode to family unity in a time of turmoil but feels more like Branagh impressing himself with the most strained camera angle to make his black-&-white photography look good. This is a ‘60s-set coming-of-age story seen through the lens of a ‘90s Guess jeans commercial.

I had the same reaction a few years back when everyone was frothing on about Alfonso Cuaron’s Roma, another impenetrably arty monochrome “masterpiece” that also wanted to recall the simple beauty of family love and that ultimately, like Belfast, failed to do so. Branagh, like Cuaron, seems less interested in recalling key moments from his working class upbringing and more obsessed with making sure you never forget his new film.

Late in the story, as their world is imploding and they are faced with moving to London, Buddy’s parents commandeer a dance hall and belt out a version of ‘Everlasting Love’. It is a totally incongruous sequence that reeks of manipulation and undoes the thin connective tissue of all the drama that went before it. But, damn, if it doesn’t look beautiful. 

And that’s how I’ll remember Belfast. Not as a dissection of social upheaval as seen through the eyes of a boy whose innocence is dismantling, or a domestic drama about the new wave of immigrants forced from their traditional homes - both themes hinted at but left unexplored by Branagh. I’ll remember Belfast as a twee collection of Irish cliches and stunningly photographed dirt and bricks.