Some things I liked some I did not.

This is a must-see and one of the best documentaries - and films - of this year.

It's the kind of movie you'll want to see a second time with someone who hasn't seen it yet, to remember what it was like to watch it for the first time.

Great example of an old-fashioned, pure-at-heart escapist event movie that doesn't pretend to be anything that it's not and has boat loads of fun being its own ludicrous self.

Syracuse (Colin Farrell) is an Irish fishermen with a young, wheelchair-bound daughter, Annie. Divorced from Annie's alcoholic mother, "Circus", his nickname, has been sober himself for four years. One day, he brings up his net and there is a beautiful, young lady caught in the threads. She is choking, gasping for air, but makes it back to breath. Thus, Circus has saved her life. When he tells his daughter a bedtime story of the event, Annie says it must be a mermaid that was captured. Dad says no, but when the woman, who says her name is Ondine, sings a haunting song which helps Circus catch more fish and lobster than normal, he himself begins to wonder. As she has no home, he places her in the seaside cabin that was belonged to his deceased mother. But, do mermaids or selkies really exist? What happens, too, when Circus and Ondine fall for each other? Will there love be broken by her need to return to the sea? This gorgeous film from acclaimed director Jordan is well worth watching, very much so. Farrelll gives a great turn, as does all of the others, including Stephen Rea as the local priest. You won't believe the extreme beauty of the setting while the story, which has some dark elements that surface late in the movie, is a heart-grabber. Indeed, see Ondine, and SOON!

"That's what I deal with—that meeting place between fairy tale and real life." - Neil Jordan Neil Jordan directs "The Good Thief". The film stars Nick Nolte as Bob, an ex convict, addict, thief and full time drunk. Speaking in slurred speech and bumbling about Southern France like a grizzly bear with a hangover, Bob spends most of his time doing good deeds for down on their luck women, taking young thieves under his wing or chatting to local police, most of whom enjoy his company despite his criminal past. He's quite literally a good thief, liked by all. The film was based on Melville's "Bob The Gambler", an influential "heist movie". Jordan's film is faithful to Melville's, whilst also staking out its own style and story.Like most of Jordan's films ("Company of Wolves", "Mona Lisa" etc), "Thief" attempts to collide a gritty crime-and-drugs plot with fairytale tropes. Nolte's part noir knight, part alcoholic on a downward slope to hell. When he attempts to pull off a dramatic casino heist, we're left at the edge of our seats, anxious to know whether fantasy wins out over the grunge. But the joke of the movie – the film sets up several possible resolutions then ends with a fairytale deus-ex machina - is in Jordan's delight in forcing us to recognise the romanticism in filth, and the grungy, seedy side of fairy tales. Noir/crime is largely a fantasy, and romantic idealism always has its sleazy flip-side.Beyond this, the film is preoccupied with doubles, replicas, doppelgangers and copies. There's a real heist and a fake heist, several twinned characters, authentics and surrogates, real paintings and fake copies, real rooms and fake mock-ups, double-crimes, double-bluffs, double crosses, two versions of every story and Jordan's usual fondness for transsexuals (muscular men with boobs and/or effeminate men) or those who undergo sex change operations, all of which again contribute to the blurring of all lines between original and copy. The germ of originality is always moving, just as Bob himself continually seems to rely on reinvention. While Melville's "Bob" was largely silent, stoic, and modelled on Sterling Hayden's role in "Asphalt Jungle", Jordan's Bob is both a fake and aware that he is a fake, continually recreating his past in order to get out of whatever fix he finds himself in. He also talks incessantly about thievery, numbers, probability theory, gambling, art etc, and idolises Pablo Picasso, who he regards, perversely, as the best thief that who lived. His prized possession is itself a Picasso, which he claims he won during a bet with the master."A film about remaking, reinvention, about the interplay between fakes and originals, became interesting to me," Jordan says, and in a way his film almost plays like a treatise on remakes. He even goes so far as to have Melville's heist literally play out as a "fake heist" within the film, which is used to distract the authorities, and audience, from the "real heist". This "real heist" then itself turns out to be a fake. The way the old, new and newer vie for attention, or even survival, is itself embodied by the cast, who like Bob (and Jordan) are all old, haggard and on the verge of retirement - a French detective Inspector, played warmly by Tcheky Karyo, is Bob's closest companion - or young, cocky and hungry for mischief. Bob survives, like Jordan and his film, because he knows how to adapt. Jordan acknowledges this autobiographical quality: "Bob eventually solves the problems inherent in the idea of a remake. He likes copies, replays, versions of versions, feints, old hands played in different ways. Even the Picasso he owns is revealed to be a double of the original, a fake. It's a good fake, though, Bob says. Painted by Keating, one of the truly great fakers." Today Paul Keatings are celebrated and sell for millions.Like Melville's film, indeed like all noirs, "Thief" is preoccupied with luck and a sort of existential indeterminism. Bob lives by the dice, but secretly dreams of the impossibly complicated heist, planned to aesthetically pleasing perfection. His artfully constructed plot fails, of course, but he is nevertheless rescued by a moment of cosmic luck (a reversal of "The Killing's" climax, again with heist maestro Sterling Hayden, released the same year as Melville's film).Not as good as "Thief" is Jordan's "Ondine", which stars Colin Farrell as an Irish fisherman who, like Bob, is a former drunk who finds himself plucking a woman, his own personal lady luck, out of darkness. He's convinced she's a mermaid and believes she can alter fortunes. Fairy tale tropes – a fisherman's love for and dependence upon a magical woman, and vice versa – and grungy, crime tropes then collide, Jordan revealing that the woman is really a drug mule, is evading gangsters and so forth. The "mermaid's" magical powers, her ability to control fate, is then revealed to be a sham. Events in the film which we perceived to be "magically" preordained are then revealed to be pure chance. This echoes the climax of "The Good Thief" in multiple ways. "Ondine" then ends with the couple living happily ever after despite a complete breakdown of their and our preconceptions; the girl isn't a magical, fairytale princess, but she's princessly despite her foibles, the fisherman isn't a hero, but is heroic despite his flaws. In each of these films, the realistic basis allows for the fairytale, and we're asked to recognise that fairy tales can't exist without something sleazy to be rescued from.Aesthetically, both films are special; hyper-moody, sensual, lots of night skies, eye-popping lights, or in the case of "Ondine", atmospheric Irish coastal towns, cold greys and cosy wool sweaters. "Thief" utilises odd jump-cuts, a nod to the French New Wave. Both films rely on mood, tone and place to make up for their weaknesses.7.9/10 - Worth one viewing.

Basically "The Secret of Roan Inish" darkened with Irish realism including with alcoholism, kidney failure and, in the case of Colin Farrell, really bad hair and an impenetrable accent. Critics made a big deal about the thickness of the Irish brogues in this gritty fairy tale and for good reason - most American audiences and I suspect most others outside Ireland itself will catch every third word. Ultimately, Neil Jordan movies are more about place, tone and the unexpected emotional pops that catch you off-guard and these are in abundance here. The frank depictions of alcoholics recovering and otherwise tell a story that make their words largely superfluous and the wide shots of Ireland's darkly beautiful coast need no verbal accompaniment. Alison Barry, as the daughter of the "recovering" alcoholic Syracuse played by Farrell, and a definitely not recovering mother is more understandable. While she genuinely does a nice job in the part, her character Annie is a wee bit too self-sufficient, mature and together given all that is against her. A little more emotional vulnerability would have made the character more believable. The plot itself is solidly credible and it is worth staying around to see how it turns out. In short, if you can find a version with English subtitles this is worth the view, if not try "The Secret of Roan Inish" instead.

Ondine was so disappointing primarily because I couldn't understand 90% of what was said due to the excessively strong accents. The strong accents may have been accurate, but most of the English speaking population aren't familiar with such strong accents.There were several great actors in Ondine, so I was really looking forward to watching it. Unfortunately, not being familiar with the "strongest" of Irish accents (and I'm part Irish) I just couldn't understand what many and especially Colin Farrell were saying. It sounded like mumbling.Today movies can easily be made for the general population and incorporate mechanisms to help facilitate the audience easily understanding the message. The subtitling in Avatar is a great example. They did everything possible to make the subtitling easy and quick to read. Many movies "don't care" if you can read the subtitles or see in the dark scene or understand what was said or not.My point is that it's LAZINESS on the part of the movie maker if they don't put any effort in broadening the appeal to the audience. In the case of Ondine, you can have a "strong" accent but still have it understandable by the general populous.