The Outsider (1979 film)
{{Short description|1979 British film by Tony Luraschi}}
{{EngvarB|date=September 2017}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=September 2017}}
{{Infobox film
| name = The Outsider
| image = Outsider_1980_film.jpg
| alt =
| caption =
| director = Tony Luraschi
| producer = Cinematic Arts B.V.,{{cite book|author=Mike Kaplan|title=Variety international showbusiness reference|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=F6IRAQAAMAAJ|access-date=20 October 2012|date=1 May 1981|publisher=Garland Pub.|isbn=978-0-8240-9341-9|page=496}} Philippe Modave (executive){{cite book|title=Film Writers|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=BpxZAAAAMAAJ|access-date=21 October 2012|year=2001|publisher=Ifilm Pub.|page=60|isbn = 9781580650359}}
| writer =
| screenplay =
| story =
| based_on = {{based on|The Heritage of Michael Flaherty|Colin Leinster}}{{cite journal |last=Greenhill |first=Steven |title=Acceptable images of Northern Ireland's troubles |journal=ThirdWay|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=rRuDSOMLLAUC&pg=PA19 |volume= 11| issue = 7 |date=July 1988 |page=19}}
| narrator =
| starring = Craig Wasson
Sterling Hayden
Patricia Quinn
Niall O'Brien
| music = Ken Thorne
| cinematography =
| editing =
| studio = Paramount Pictures
| distributor = Cinema International Corporation (UK){{cite web|url=http://www.tcd.ie/irishfilm/print.php?search=mainname&q=songs&exactMatch=1&extraSearch= |title=Irish Film & TV Research Online – Trinity College Dublin |publisher=Tcd.ie |access-date=20 February 2017}}
| released = {{Film date|df=yes|1979|11|29|London}}{{cite magazine|magazine=Screen International|date=3 November 1979|page=24|title='Outsider' opening snubbed by LFF|last=Vaines|first=Colin|author-link=Colin Vaines}}{{cite book|author=John Pym|title=Time Out film guide|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=5v18384ZR_QC|access-date=21 October 2012|date=1 January 1989|publisher=Penguin Books|isbn=978-0-14-029414-9|page=899}} – or The Outsider, The (1979, Neth, 128 min) d/sc{{cite book|author=Jürgen Elvert|title=Nordirland in Geschichte und Gegenwart|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=29nrLLarIM0C&pg=PA479|access-date=21 October 2012|year=1994|publisher=Franz Steiner Verlag|isbn=978-3-515-06102-5|pages=479–}} – Tony Luraschis Film (GB 1979, nach dem Roman von Colin Leinster)
| country =
| language = English
| budget =
| gross =
}}
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.
Production
Luraschi, who had worked as an assistant director with Stanley Kramer and Roger Vadim, had never been to Ireland until 1976.{{cite magazine|author=New York Media, LLC|title=New York Magazine|website=Newyorkmetro.com|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=veUCAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA62|access-date=21 October 2012|date=28 April 1980|publisher=New York Media, LLC|pages=62–64|issn=0028-7369}}
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.{{cite book|author=Arthur Flynn|title=The story of Irish film|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=XN1kAAAAMAAJ|access-date=21 October 2012|year=2005|publisher=Currach Press|isbn=978-1-85607-914-3}}{{cite book|author=Arthur Flynn|title=Irish film 100 years|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=E_IpAAAAYAAJ|access-date=21 October 2012|year=1996|publisher=Kestrel Books|isbn=978-1-900505-40-6|page=138}}
Release
Despite the distributor's hope, the film was rejected by the 1979 London Film Festival. It opened at The Gate 2 cinema in Bloomsbury, London on 29 November 1979 during the festival.
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.
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."
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."{{cite book|author=James MacKillop|title=Contemporary Irish Cinema: From The Quiet Man to Dancing at Lughnasa|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=fwInSShlVUQC&pg=PA223|access-date=21 October 2012|year=1999|publisher=Syracuse University Press|isbn=978-0-8156-0568-3|page=2}}
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."{{cite book|author=Bowker|title=Variety's Film Reviews: 1978–1980|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_nBZAAAAMAAJ|access-date=21 October 2012|year=1983|publisher=Bowker|isbn=978-0-8352-2795-7}}
References
{{reflist}}
External links
- {{IMDb title|0079687}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Outsider, The}}
Category:Films about the Irish Republican Army
Category:Films about The Troubles (Northern Ireland)
Category:Films based on American novels
Category:Films shot in Northern Ireland
Category:Paramount Pictures films
Category:Films scored by Ken Thorne