Latest news with #TheLongGoodFriday
Sunday World
27-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Sunday World
Pierce Brosnan hits back at criticism of Irish accent in Mobland
The Drogheda-born and Navan-raised star plays the lead role in director Guy Ritchie's Paramount+ series Pierce Brosnan has responded to criticism of his Irish accent in TV series MobLand after it was described as 'all over the place'. The Drogheda-born and Navan-raised star plays the lead role in director Guy Ritchie's Paramount+ series. The contemporary crime drama is based around the fictional Harrigan family and their influence on London's criminal underworld. It features Brosnan (72) and Dame Helen Mirren, 46 years after they both starred in John Mackenzie's iconic 1979 gangster film The Long Good Friday. But the veteran screen stars have found themselves taking heat over their Irish accents in the new show, with Brosnan's in particular coming under fire. In their review of the show, The Irish Independent dismissed it as 'all over the place and a huge distraction', but the actor argued that his role as family patriarch Conrad Harrigan demanded a broader Irish accent than his own. 'My own accent is very soft,' he says in the latest issue of Radio Times. 'Conrad's accent is a million miles away from me.' He went on to explain that the inspiration for the accent was a man suggested by his dialect coach, adding: "I told him that I needed a Kerry accent, so he gave me the name of a man and I googled the guy and that was it. Pierce Brosnan News in 90 Seconds - May 27th "It was a Kerry accent and so I just gave it full tilt." The "brutish, cunning, charming and dangerous' Conrad is the flipside of the suave and sophisticated secret agent James Bond who Brosnan depicted across four blockbuster films from 1995 to 2002. Saying he enjoys playing the villain, Brosnan added: 'like him. I love him. I enjoy him. I mean, I don't want to be that person – he's a psychopath. 'Yes, there are no holds barred. You own the stage, you have wings to fly and be anything you wish.' Brosnan is working with celebrated director Ritchie for the first time in Mobland, who had made his mark from Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels to big-budget Hollywood reinterpretations of Sherlock Holmes. 'I have great admiration for Guy Ritchie's work and the style that he has created for himself,' Brosnan said. 'The landscape of film-making that he has embroidered over the years is wildly entertaining.' Referring to the Harrigans, he said the family is 'mangled and warped, twisted, incestuous and dangerous'. Brosnan who was 25-years old when he made his screen debut as an unnamed IRA assassin in The Long Good Friday, is reuniting with Mirren - who also stars alongside him in forthcoming film The Thursday Murder Club 'It still holds up as a British gangster movie,' Brosnan said of the iconic flick. 'And now, all these years later, Helen and I are working together again.' In the interview, Brosnan also spoke of the worry and excitement he faces when taking on new roles, saying: "Every job is a challenge and it all comes with a thump of anxiety, because you have to do something. "What are you doing on the stage? Why are you there? So that's constant. You live with that. You live with that stress all the time, and that's what's so exhilarating. "That's what makes you alive." Brosnan will appear in a film adaptation of Richard Osman's The Thursday Murder Club book, which is set for release in August.
RTÉ News
04-05-2025
- Entertainment
- RTÉ News
Amongst the Wolves director Mark O'Connor picks the must-see crime films that you may not have seen
"There's been a lot of films that have had an influence on me," says director Mark O'Connor by way of understatement as he sees his latest, Amongst the Wolves, arrive in cinemas. Watch: The trailer for Amongst the Wolves. The Dubliner joins RTÉ Entertainment via Zoom to pick the crime movies that have shaped his work but that he feels have been overlooked by a new generation - or are still stuck on the to-see lists of older viewers. " Bicycle Thieves was a huge film, but that's a different genre," the Cardboard Gangsters director continues as he lists off his influences. "The French New Wave, Italian neo-realism, and British cinema of Alan Clarke, Ken Loach's films. Films like Saturday Night and Sunday Morning - massive influence, love that film. So believable, so realistic. And then, of course, Shane Meadows's movies in the UK like This Is England and A Room for Romeo Brass." But with time tight (and a gun to his head), O'Connor picks these films from the crime genre: City of God (Fernando Meirelles, Kátia Lund, 2002) "You need more than guts to be a good gangster. You need ideas." The slums of Rio de Janeiro are the setting for this quadruple-Oscar-nominated tour de force. And when you get your breath back, there's a spin-off series and film - both called City of Men. Mark O'Connor: When City of God came out, it had a big impact on me. The way it was directed, the way it was shot, the pacing. It was very fast and energetic, and I loved that. It was so real, like, so believable. I know they cast kids from the favelas for that, some of them were involved in different stuff. That film definitely had an influence on me as a filmmaker. The Long Good Friday (John Mackenzie, 1980) "It's my manor!" Bob Hoskins's big-screen breakout gave the crime genre one of its most iconic characters in Harold Shand, the London mobster whose empire comes crashing down over an Easter weekend. Helen Mirren is superb as Shand's other half, Victoria, and a young Pierce Brosnan makes his big-screen debut. Forty-five years on, The Long Good Friday's ending still ranks with cinema's best. Mark O'Connor: I think it's overlooked! Bob Hoskins's performance is amazing. It's so powerful, and it's just a real old-school crime film, like, classy crime film. It feels dated but in a good way. There's a big Irish connection in it with Pierce Brosnan at the end. And it's a great shot at the end, that last shot... The camera picks up so much, I've come to realise that over the years. The smallest details really, really matter. "You don't make up for your sins in church. You do it in the streets." The film that announced Martin Scorsese to the wider world was also a portent of what was to come from Robert De Niro - burning up the screen here as loose(est) cannon John 'Johnny Boy' Civello. Harvey Keitel plays Charlie Cappa, the mob protégé torn between the demands of his boss Uncle Giovanni (Cesare Danova), his feelings for his epileptic girlfriend Teresa (Amy Robinson), and his bond with childhood pal Johnny Boy. Mark O'Connor: I don't think that many people have seen it. Obviously, cinephiles and film people would have seen it, but that would be a definite one [that deserves a wider audience]. It's the mafia on the street level and just so Italian. I actually think it's probably Scorsese's most authentic film. Goodfellas is incredible, but I just think with Mean Streets there's an element of truth there that's just entwined in it. You can't replicate that unless you've lived in Little Italy. An unbelievable performance from De Niro. He's so wild and just raw - and unhinged! White Heat (Raoul Walsh, 1949) "Made it, Ma! Top of the world!" White Heat marked James Cagney's return to Warner Bros after going out on his own - and he was back with a bang! Shamefully overlooked for an Oscar nomination for Best Actor, Cagney's performance as mammy-obsessed psychotic gangster Arthur 'Cody' Jarrett has influenced countless others in the decades since. Need another reason? Well, White Heat also has two of the best scenes in cinema history. Mark O'Connor: I was a big fan of the black-and-white gangster films. I used to have loads of VHS tapes and I had all those films. But if I was to choose one, you'd have to say White Heat. It's brilliant - Cody's relationship with his mother and everything. And that ending... Imagine if that was nowadays with the proper colour and sound?! James Cagney was an amazing actor. Humphrey Bogart was an amazing actor in his own way as well. He was such a smart and intelligent actor, but Cagney was the raw kind. La Haine (Mathieu Kassovitz, 1995) "How you fall doesn't matter, it's how you land." The landmark French movie that saw writer-director Mathieu Kassovitz win Best Director at the Cannes Film Festival also set a new standard in urban storytelling. La Haine (Hatred) follows pals Vinz (Vincent Cassel), Hubert (Hubert Koundé), and Saïd (Saïd Taghmaoui) over a day and night as the hand of fate guides them to an unforgettable conclusion. Mark O'Connor: It's quite well known, but then again, it's not well known! It's 30 years ago and a lot of people nowadays wouldn't know it. Again, any film person's going to know it. That had a big influence on me. It was the performances - Vincent Cassel, it was him. I just thought he was amazing in that. He was kind of like a cardboard gangster in a way. I know myself and John Connors, that was a big influence on us when we talked about Cardboard Gangsters. I think the cinematography is really good in it. It's a very structured film in terms of the framing. It's not like Mean Streets, which is just kind of wild and loose and handheld. There are some amazing shots in there - the trumpet shot where they're standing on the balcony where you track in and you zoom out. The music as well, the whole hip-hop thing, was brilliant. And then the riots as a backdrop - love that. I love when you have a backdrop to a movie, something else going on in the background. Dead Presidents (The Hughes Brothers, 1995) "Well, that's Uncle Sam for you, baby. Money to burn." After their blistering debut Menace II Society, brothers Albert and Allen Hughes aimed for the epic with their next film. It's the story of Anthony Curtis (Menace II Society star Larenz Tate) who leaves Brooklyn for a tour of duty in Vietnam and then sees all the dominoes fall when he comes home. A great supporting cast includes Keith David, Chris Tucker, N'Bushe Wright, and future Sopranos stars Michael Imperioli and Tony Sirico. Mark O'Connor: Menace II Society is a brilliant film, but Dead Presidents is amazing. That's one that people need to see and I think that's probably a better film than Menace II Society. The soundtrack is amazing; it's got this soul vibe and funky grooves from the Seventies. Menace II Society was so raw and I think it sparked a lot of the other ones (movies), but I prefer probably Dead Presidents, just for the authenticity in some way. "I like the stink of the streets. It makes me feel good." Sergio Leone's final film is also the last part of his Once Upon a Time Trilogy, after Once Upon a Time in the West (1968) and Duck, You Sucker! (1971). Based on the Harry Grey novel The Hoods, it charts decades of US history through the lives of David 'Noodles' Aaronson (Robert De Niro) and Maximilian 'Max' Bercovicz (James Woods) - corner boys who become kingpins. Leone's original version was 269 minutes long. A 229-minute version was shown at Cannes in 1984 with a restored 251-minute version screening at the festival in 2012. Because of rights issues, the wait for the original 269-minute version continues to this day. Whatever you do, make sure you don't watch the hacked 139-minute version that was released in the US in 1984. Mark O'Connor: It's pretty well known, but I don't think that many people think of it [compared to The Godfather ]. Once Upon a Time in America is so epic and so nostalgic as well, there's something so incredibly powerful [about that]. It's about time and it's really sad. You're seeing De Niro's character's life flash before his eyes. He looks back on when he was a kid and now it's all gone - he's a very old man. There's something about time with me as well, it's just so tragic in some way. I find it hard to look at old photographs of my kids because I just get so nostalgic and sad. Looking back at my own films? Ah, I don't care about them! As he signs out of one Zoom interview to go to another, O'Connor says of his latest, Amongst the Wolves: "We made it for 16 grand and we're getting a release all around Ireland. It's going to be opening in the cinemas in America as well. It's so amazing for the cast and crew. Our producer, Jeff O'Toole, put the 16 grand in. [I was] Pulling in massive favours, cast and crew that were just so, so giving of their time. We wrote it in six months, shot it in 15 days, post-production two months. We had it done in less than a year. Sometimes you can literally spend three years on developing a script and it gets very, very frustrating where you're trying to find finance. We just said, 'Let's go and do this!'"
Yahoo
30-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Helen Mirren Wants More Movies About Real Women in the Secret Service, as Opposed to a Female 007
Helen Mirren thinks there should be more movies about real women who have operated as Secret Service agents, instead of adding a female James Bond to that particular cinematic universe. 'The whole concept of James Bond is drenched and born out of profound sexism,' she told The Standard in an interview published Thursday. 'Women have always been a major and incredibly important part of the Secret Service, they always have been,' she continued. 'And very brave. If you hear about what women did in the French Resistance, they're amazingly, unbelievably courageous. So I would tell real stories about extraordinary women who've worked in that world.' Mirren plays a mob wife in the Paramount+ series 'MobLand' to her husband portrayed by former Bond actor Pierce Brosnan, who knows a thing or two about crime-related stories. The duo previously co-starred in the movie 'The Long Good Friday' in 1990. 'I was never a great ward [of Bond],' Mirren noted. 'I'm a huge fan of Pierce Brosnan, I mean massive fan. I mean, oh my god. Obviously, he's gorgeous and everything, and I think he's fabulous in 'MobLand,' but he also happens to be one of the nicest people you'll ever have the pleasure to work with. And indeed Daniel Craig, who I've met and know a little bit. Again, a very lovely gracious person.' 'The whole series of James Bond, it was not my thing. It really wasn't. I never liked James Bond. I never liked the way women were in James Bond,' she concluded. Amazon MGM Studios took over the Bond franchise in February, a move that came as a surprise after decades of control by Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli. The franchise had been in the hands of the creative individuals since Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman purchased the rights to Ian Fleming's novels in 1961. After Broccoli died, his daughter, Barbara, took over alongside his stepson Wilson. 'My life has been dedicated to maintaining and building upon the extraordinary legacy that was handed to Michael and me by our father, producer Cubby Broccoli,' Barbara said in a statement. 'I have had the honour of working closely with four of the tremendously talented actors who have played 007 and thousands of wonderful artists within the industry. With the conclusion of 'No Time to Die' and Michael retiring from the films, I feel it is time to focus on my other projects.' More recently, Jen Salke just exited Amazon MGM this past week — in part over the 007 franchise — with the studio still intent on releasing a theatrical movie slate in 2025. The post Helen Mirren Wants More Movies About Real Women in the Secret Service, as Opposed to a Female 007 appeared first on TheWrap.
Yahoo
28-03-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Pierce Brosnan praises 'razor sharp intellect' of MobLand co-star Tom Hardy
Watch: Pierce Brosnan shares his verdict on MobLand co-star Tom Hardy Pierce Brosnan has paid tribute to his MobLand co-star Tom Hardy, saying the Venom star "has a very fine mind which is razor sharp". Although he admits the two actors didn't socialise off-screen during production on Guy Ritchie's lavish new ten-part gangster saga, which hits Paramount+ on Sunday, 31 March, Brosnan was effusive with praise for Hardy, who plays mob fixer Harry De Souza to Brosnan's crimelord boss Conrad Harrigan. "[Tom Hardy's] brilliant. He's brilliant," Brosnan told Yahoo UK. "He has such an underplayed style, and he really brings you in. He has the voice, and the voice he knows how to use seductively. He has the heart and soul of an actor, and the intellect, he has a very fine mind which is razor sharp. "He has a rich history of his own life, which he uses, and we got on really well. We didn't socialise or anything like that. I went to work, did the job, and went home." The series opens with a microcosm of Harry's relationship with Conrad, as the two deal with a turf war that threatens the Harrigan family's illegal empire. Conrad calls the shots, but it's Harry that does the dirty work for him. And it quickly becomes clear that Conrad is not afraid to get his bands dirty himself though. "[Conrad] is a villain," explains Brosnan, cutting to the chase. "He's a family man, he's a businessman, and he is a very dangerous man, and he's a man that is somewhat imbalanced in life. He has a wife that's even more off-kilter than he is, and the two of them run a family business concerning guns, fentanyl, heroin, you name it. They're from Ireland, they're from the south, they're both joined at the hip emotionally, spiritually." Watch a trailer for MobLand Helen Mirren plays Conrad's wife, Maeve, who quickly emerges as a Lady MacBeth figure, and perhaps the true power behind the throne. Brosnan describes Maeve as "a pain in the arse" and "a mad b****", before quickly adding "but she's my wife, I love her". The two first shared credits on 1980's The Long Good Friday, but never shared a scene together. They've now worked together twice in quick succession, filming the adaptation of Richard Osman's Thursday Murder Club in 2024. "Last summer, [Helen and I] worked together for the first time on The Thursday Murder Club, and that's when this job came across my desk. Guy Ritchie sent me five episodes of the show, I said 'yes', Helen and I have the same agent, and she read it, said 'are you going to do it?' and I said 'yes', she wanted to come back to England, and so did I, so 'I'm in'. Great. Then Tom [Hardy] came on board, we heard that Tom was interested and Tom jumped in, then we had game on." Filming MobLand over the past five month has been a real sprint for the finish line, with Brosnan still filming scenes for the show the week it hits Paramount+, but it seems like a challenge that he was happy to take on. "I've been on the road here for five months in England, so it's time to go home to my family," said the 71-year-old actor. "But we had a great time. You show up, you do the work, it goes very fast. If I understand the text and I know the text then you study, you study, you study, you come prepared, and you show up on time, and you do it. And you do that every day, and that's what we did. It really moved fast." "They're still at work today, they're out in the forest killing people or something like that, i'm not sure what they're doing, but my job is done, bar the shouting. Talking to you, walking down the red carpet, and saying hello to everyone, here's the show: MobLand. "It's been great fun, I have great gratitude for a job like this at this time, [it was] unexpected." MobLand premieres on Paramount+ on Sunday, 30 March.
The Guardian
09-02-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
PH Moriarty obituary
PH Moriarty, who has died aged 86 after suffering from dementia, came late to acting as he approached 40, but made an indelible impression, most chillingly in two British gangster films. The simmering menace he brought to the screen led one critic to observe that he could 'make Hannibal Lecter look like Noddy'. Distinctive for his moustache, smart grey suit and tie, he was ever present in The Long Good Friday (1980) as Razors, henchman to Bob Hoskins's brutal underworld property developer, Harold Shand, who seeks to build his empire through the regeneration of London's Docklands. Moriarty is seen driving Hoskins around on a quest to discover who is threatening this ambition (it turns out to be the IRA). After placing the barrel of a pistol in the ear of a police informer interrogated by Shand (played by Paul Barber), Razors reveals the source of his nickname. As he lifts his shirt to display endless scars on his torso, patched up by what he describes as '65 inches of stitching', Hoskins says he is known as 'the human spirograph'. Picking up a machete, Razors tells Barber: 'Now you're going to feel what it's like, boy.' Several slashes follow in what proves to be just one of the violent scenes that, combined with Barrie Keeffe's intelligent script, made The Long Good Friday a high-water mark in the history of British gangster films. Moriarty is also alongside Hoskins when rival gang bosses are suspended upside down on meathooks in an abattoir. The film set him on a career largely typecast playing such characters, but on both sides of the law. 'A guy in America saw it just after it came out, rang me up, the next thing, I was over there and starring in Jaws 3-D,' said Moriarty, who played the cockney sidekick to Simon MacCorkindale's British oceanographer and photographer in that 1983 film. At the end of the following decade, he appeared in Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels (1998), the writer-director Guy Ritchie's acclaimed gangsters and gamblers drama, as 'Hatchet' Harry Lonsdale, a porn seller who bludgeons his enemies to death. When a criminal played by Nick Moran loses £500,000 in a card game rigged by Harry, he is given a week to pay up. The agent Simon Drew said of Moriarty: 'The actor in him could make you fear for your life. If you knew him, the scowl quickly changed to a wry smile.' Paul Hugh Moriarty was born in Deptford, south London, the son of William Moriarty, a lorry driver, and his wife, Mary (nee Griffin). On leaving St Joseph's Roman Catholic school at 15, he trained as a cooper at the Admiralty's victualling yard for six years – while boxing as an amateur – before becoming a stevedore at Surrey docks, Rotherhithe, where he lost the sight of his left eye in an accident. When the TV producer Tony Garnett was filming there for a 1978 episode of Law & Order, Moriarty's brother-in-law, GF Newman – the writer of the gritty four-part drama questioning the judicial system – suggested him for a part. As a result, he played a prisoner in the final episode and, as there was already an actor called Paul Moriarty, he took the professional name PH Moriarty. He was then cast as a pub bartender in the cult mods and rockers film Quadrophenia (1979) before growing a beard for the big-screen version of the banned TV play Scum (1979) to play Hunt, the borstal warder checking in Ray Winstone's young offender in a manner that suggests the staff are as unpleasant as the inmates. 'You have heard of us, Carlin, aye?' he asks as his colleague roughs up a teenager who has assaulted an officer at a previous institution. In a similar vein, Moriarty played one of the prison warders giving a beating to Jimmy Boyle in A Sense of Freedom (1981), based on the Glaswegian gangland murderer's autobiography. He became a regular on television and was clearly cast to type when he was credited as 'Evil Jim Dalton' in a 1990 episode of The Paradise Club. Later, he brought menace to the Sci-Fi Channel series Dune (2000) and its sequel, Children of Dune (2003), as Gurney Halleck, a character distinctive for a whip wound on his jawline. The producers saw that the scar, combined with the actor's damaged eye, made his face incredibly expressive, angry and sad at the same time. Moriarty's later films included Evil Never Dies (2014) and Rise of the Footsoldier: Origins (2021). In 1961, Moriarty married Margaret Newman. She, their son, Mark, and daughter, Kathleen, survive him. Another son, Neil, died at three days old. PH (Paul Hugh) Moriarty, actor, born 23 September 1938; died 2 February 2025
