Tss5078 White Irish Drinkers is a coming of age story, centered around a boy who doesn't quite fit in with the rest of his dysfunctional family. It's a common theme in many similar films and to be honest, I didn't see anything here, that made this movie stand out from the rest of them. This is just another coming of age film without many surprises. The story wasn't bad, but it wasn't anything special. The acting was OK, as was the pace of the film. I'm finding it really difficult to say anything positive or negative about White Irish Drinkers, because the truth is, it's just a simple, ordinary story that I've seen a hundred times before. The names and places always change, and there was a familiar face or two, but nothing about this film stands out positively or negatively in any way. It's just a very common type of story with a very ordinary cast. Everyone does their job and the story gets told, I don't know what you'll think, but my reaction to this film was simple neutrality. A decent movie, but easily forgotten, as nothing made any kind of impact on me at all.

jamfitz001 I graduated High School in 1976. I grew up in Bay Ridge/Sunset Park. I am Irish. My father was a drunk. My hobby is painting. The opening shots of the Bridge and then a pan of OLPH hit a cord with anyone who knows the area.I wanted to like this movie a lot. It was brought down by a kind of predictable plot and predictable characters. It was brought up by some great (but uneven) acting and the way that Bay Ridge itself becomes a character in the film.In a bigger movie, Karen Allen might have gotten an Oscar nod for her performance as a good-hearted, long-suffering, worn down Mother. Leslie Murphy totally nails her part as a Brooklyn girl. Less successful are the male leads. Steven Lang overplays the stereotype tough working class drunkard dad. Geoffrey Wigdor channeled a little too much Fonzie/Adam Dice Clay into his characterization of a Brooklyn Punk. Nick Thurston is endearing as a somewhat wide-eyed caught in a moment I can't get out of Catholic School boy wanna' be artist whose life is made difficult by the people around him for no real explainable reason. But he doesn't even try for a Brooklyn accent, and that strikes me as a little out of place.But the bar/party scenes, the neighborhood, the stoops and corners are the authentic feel of Bay Ridge, although, in it's entirely it's a much nicer more hopeful place than shown (although the 70's were it's low point). There are a lot of small moments in this movie that ring true. When Brian opens Danny's notebook that is a real punch in the gut. Two young guys sitting on a stoop talking...dead on Brooklyn, there. The idea that people would run naked through Greenwood Cemetery (one of the most famous busiest cemeteries in the country, which is crossed with roads) didn't make a whole lot of sense to me.Overall, I would recommend this movie for the acting and the little things that it got right, although you have to overlook some senseless derivative plot elements to enjoy it.

jackie-135-447584 The film stars Nick Thurston as the wantabe painter. He lives with his mother Margaret (Karen Allen) and father Paddy (Stephen Lang) and practices his art in the basement beneath their apartment, keeping it a secret from everyone but his big brother Danny (Geoff Wigdor). Danny has always taken the beatings of their abusive alcoholic father while Paddy has never laid a hand on Nick. Nick tries to stay away from Danny's criminal plans but he also doesn't want to end up like his soon to be blue-collar friends or his buddy Todd (Zachary Booth), who took a college scholarship (which was unheard of in his neighborhood). He works for a local theater helping the owner, Whitey (Peter Riegert), book local bands. When Whitey books the Rolling Stones for a one hour gig on their way through town it seems like the theater's income problems could be over. Then Brian feels influenced into helping Danny rob the show's loot. He has to deal with tough family love, deciding what he wants to do with his life as well as a possible romance with an old high school crush (Leslie Murphy).

bss09 I'm drawn to movies that deal with families that are not as picture perfect as Hollywood movies normally depict them to be. White Irish Drinkers reveals the dark side of an alcoholic, dehumanized father, a mother who is trapped in an abusive marriage, and two coming-of-age brothers who are forced find their own way to escape their bleak futures---- at whatever cost.For a film marketed around the line "Blood is thicket than Brooklyn" -- it's an honest and heartwarming independent. It's a genuine story that tests the power of loyalty in the middle of crime-infested Brooklyn.. White Irish Drinkers is definitely one of those movies that puts everything into perspective.