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Veronica Guerin Director: Joel Schumacher Rated: MA 15+ Screening Trak & Palace Nova East End Cinemas  Based
on a true story, this is a portrayal of a relentless investigative
journalist, obsessed with organised crime, particularly heroin, in
Dublin in the 1990s. Australian born Cate Blanchett (‘Elizabeth’)
plays Veronica Guerin, who puts herself in increasingly dangerous
situations to research articles for the 'Sunday Independent' newspaper,
despite warnings from her family, the police and underworld figures.
She sees little kids on housing estates playing with used syringes and bigger kids becoming addicts and believes no-one else is taking the situation seriously enough and it’s up to her to keep the problem in the public eye until the authorities take action. Eventually they do; laws are changed and the baddies get arrested, but too late to save our heroine. Director Joel Schumacher was responsible for the two disastrous ‘Batman’ sequels and has done a better job with Guerin’s story. It’s hard-hitting, action-packed, violent and suspenseful in parts, but is let down somewhat by excess glossiness, i.e. not having enough gritty realism to captivate a non-Irish audience. Blanchett looks a little too much like Princess Diana; her husband, son and mother (Brenda Fricker) are a little too perfect and the cop informer she relies on is a little too compliant. Not being familiar with Guerin’s story as it happened, it’s hard to say whether these judgements are too harsh but to this viewer the treatment smacks of Hollywood. Nevertheless, advocates of tougher law and order policies will be pleased with the outcome, and believe the efforts of this fiercely determined woman were worth the price she paid. |
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