Saoirse Ronan : Brooklyn Reviews/Reactions

Re: Brooklyn - www.boxofficemojo.com latest

zorro, they made the correction:


A previous version of this post said Fox Searchlight was adding 795 theaters for Brooklyn, when in fact it's only adding 61. The article and predictions have been updated accordingly. The Krampus prediction has also been expanded on with added detail.


They are predicting a little under 2.8 million which makes sense because despite the theater count increasing slightly, the PTA will go down a bit. This confirms my suspicion that Fox Searchlight will use the Oscar and other awards noms as a launching point and expand the film's theater count to its greatest extent.

An excerpt from a bloggers review….

Here is an excerpt from a blogger by the name of Kate Ponders. The review is quite long but very well written and quite funny. Check the whole thing out.


I loved everything about this film. It is sweet and sticky, without inducing toothache; romantic, exquisitely performed throughout, and perfectly under-scripted. The cinematography is utterly delectable, making me truly believe that the 1950s is the most desirable time in all of history. It is such a rare treat and privilege to see Saoirse Ronan – the little girl from Atonement who grew up so that everyone feels ancient – blossom into a sublime and subtle actress with even more greatness ahead. She is dazzling.


http://tinyurl.com/nlxs2k7

Reese Witherspoon….

Reese Witherspoon is a big fan of Saoirse's work in Brooklyn....


reesewitherspoon#MondayMuse: #SaiorseRonan of the film #Brooklyn. (#NickHornby wrote Brooklyn's script & #YvesBelanger was the director of photography.) Saiorse's performance is mesmerizing! It's in theaters now; I highly recommend you go see it.


http://tinyurl.com/p2t6md4

Another great review….

From WTOP (Washington DC)

By Jason Fraley | @JFrayWTOP
December 11, 2015 2:23 am


WASHINGTON — The Golden Globe nominees were just announced on Thursday. So we’re helping you prioritize with reviews of three of the nominees: “Brooklyn,” “The Danish Girl” and “Room.”

While all three are nominated for Globes, none of them has an American studio as its primary production company. “Brooklyn” is a joint production from Ireland, the UK and Canada, “The Danish Girl” is a British, German and American collaboration and “Room” hails from Ireland and Canada, but all three feature universal themes this award season, particularly immigration, identity and survival.

Immigration — ‘Brooklyn’

During a time of heated debate over the merits vs. dangers of immigration in 2015 America, along comes a little movie reminding us of America’s promise as a land of hope, refuge and opportunity for dreamers beyond our shores. Among so many other admirable qualities, “Brooklyn” is a classic love note to Ellis Island, the Statue of Liberty and the inspirational narrative of the American immigrant.

Fittingly, the film’s heroine is named Eilis, the sort of name you’d get if you combined the phonics of “Irish” and “Ellis.” Semantic intentions aside, Eilis (Saoirse Ronan) is a strong yet soft-spoken Irish immigrant who lands in 1950s Brooklyn, where she lands a retail job in a department store (under boss Jessica Paré of “Mad Men”) and finds love in a blue-collar Italian boyfriend (Emory Coehn), who loves the Brooklyn Dodgers. But when her past (Domhnal Gleeson) comes knocking, she must choose between the two countries she loves, weighing her heart against her dreams, family and lifestyle.

Adapted by Nick Hornby from his own novel — written under the alias Colm Tóibín– “Brooklyn” is good old-fashioned storytelling in the absolute best sense of the word. Part of this is due to the careful, patient pacing of director John Crowley (“Intermission”), who pays close attention to life’s more intimate details even through the most life-changing moments, before bringing us full circle.

Perhaps a bigger reason for the “classic” feel is Ronan’s performance, carrying herself with the yesteryear grace of Hollywood’s Golden Age. Her superstar storm has been brewing since her Oscar nomination in “Atonement” (2007) and her BAFTA nomination in “The Lovely Bones” (2009). Now, “Brooklyn” should be the one to truly put her on the map as her closest shot at winning Best Actress.

Like Agata Trzebuchowska in the Polish gem “Ida” (2014), Ronan invites our undying sympathies with a quiet presence we just can’t take our eyes off. When she waves to her family from a ship’s balcony, we feel the anxiety of embarking into the unknown. When she flirts with budding romance, we blush along with her cheeks. And when she breaks down in homesick tears, we cry along with her.

“I wish that I could stop feeling like I want to be an Irish girl in Ireland,” she tells her doctor.

“Home sickness is like any other sickness. It will pass,” he replies.

After watching “Brooklyn,” you’ll have a similar feeling in your gut — a bittersweet longing to return home to this beautiful little movie for another viewing and nothing but gratitude for the experience.

4-stars

Canadian review….


Saoirse Ronan shines in Brooklyn with her commanding performance By: Alison Gillmor

Posted: 12/10/2015 12:25 PM (Winnipeg Free Press)

A young Irish girl, Eilis Lacey (Saoirse Ronan), immigrates to New York, missing the familiar old world and uncertain about the possibilities of the new. She is also torn between two men, one in each country.

Brooklyn might sound like a classic immigrant tale, or an old-fashioned romance, or a bit of both. On the surface, the set-up seems 1c84 simple, even conventional. But a subtler story runs underneath the surface, through muffled, muted emotions and slow discoveries.

Scripted by Nick Hornby (High Fidelity) and directed by John Crowley (Closed Circuit), this adaptation doesn’t quite match the complexity of Colm Tóibín’s 2009 novel, which describes characters whose feelings are so deeply buried they are unable to express them to others, or even to themselves. That’s a hard thing to convey on the page, and even harder to put across on screen.

But the production is blessed with the astonishing talents of Ronan, who earned an Oscar nomination at age 13 for her role in Atonement and has earned a Golden Globe nomination for Brooklyn.

In the hands of a lesser talent, the pivotal role of Eilis might have read as just another passive, pretty ingénue. With sure but small gestures, Ronan manages to suggest both luminous innocence and reserves of strength that Eilis is only beginning to understand. It’s a quietly commanding performance.


At the start of the story, which is set in the early 1950s, Eilis lives with her widowed mother and her sister, Rose (Fiona Glascott), in Enniscorthy, a pinched and narrow southern Irish town. There are few prospects for work or for marriage, many of the young men having left for jobs in London or Liverpool.

The enterprising Rose, with the help of a priest (Jim Broadbent) who now lives in America, makes plans to send Eilis to New York.

"How do you feel about that?" an acquaintance later asks her. Not only does Eilis not know, she’s never allowed herself to ask that question. People in Enniscorthy aren’t given to wondering how they feel.

Eilis’s new life in Brooklyn has been arranged by others. She works at a department store and lives at a boarding house run by the hilariously imperious Mrs. Kehoe (Julie Walters), but she is desperately homesick.

Then she meets Tony (Emory Cohen), a sweet-natured, wide-open Italian-American plumber. Just as Eilis’s longing for Ireland starts to subside and she sees that it can be "nice to talk to people who don’t know your auntie," a family tragedy calls her back.

She falls into the comfort of familiar faces and begins a friendship with Jim (Domhnall Gleeson), a young man from a "good family."

But Eilis has been changed by her American experience, and she finds that Enniscorthy is not quite home either.

"I don’t know if I have a home," she says at one point. The story pivots on Eilis’s realization that she must figure out how — and where — to make her own life.

Hornby’s sensitive script is not afraid of silences, and Crowley observes his actors with tender, unforced intimacy. The production takes care with period details without fussing over them unduly.

If there’s a problem with Brooklyn, it’s that the absolute loveliness of the romantic scenes occasionally overwhelms the emotional ambiguities seen in Tóibín’s novel.

That seems like a minor issue in a film so genuine and so moving.


http://tinyurl.com/jzpv5fk

Tweets….


Mindy KalingVerified account ‏@mindykaling 9h9 hours ago

#BrooklynMovie is fantastic. Saoirse Ronan is legit luminous, a word I swore I would never use in my lifetime. Also Nick Hornby script 💯


Neil Mathieson ‏@4Real_Deal_Neil 11h11 hours ago

"Brooklyn" is impeccably lovely, a top to bottom revelation. Saoirse Ronan's indelible face will forever be a cinematic landmark.


Guy Lodge ‏@GuyLodge 14h14 hours ago

TV presenters, we're well past the point where you can make cute jokes about not knowing how to pronounce Saoirse Ronan's name. Look it up.

Halifax Bloggers….


DECEMBER 10, 2015
Directed by John Crowley | Written by Nick Hornby, adapting a Colm Toibin novel | 111 min | ▲▲▲▲△

Saoirse Ronan is on point as Ellis, the young woman who in John Crowley’s 1950′s-set diasporic drama travels from rural Ireland to Brooklyn, New York for a new life, and inevitably, first love. This is an unabashedly romantic yarn, one that trades in a currency of weepy looks, swelling strings, and straight-ahead storytelling. But it’s also patently earnest, thoughtful, and moving. It avoids any danger of the maudlin by Hornby’s sharp script, spliced with a subtle but consistent humor, and Ronan’s typically A-Grade chops.

It’s Ellis’ sister, Rose (Fiona Glascott), who encourages her to go west, leaving her and their mother. With the sponsorship help of a friendly Irish priest (Jim Broa 2000 dbent),Ellis survives a traumatic Atlantic sea crossing in a windowless cabin. Taking work at a New York upscale department store (managed by Jessica Paré—the Irish/UK/Canada co-pro means Montreal locations and actors), she lives in a boarding house for women on Clinton Street run by Julie Walters. And that’s where many of the film’s best moments take place, whether the chucklesome asides at the dining room table with the various tenants, or in a moment of truth between two in an upstairs bathroom.

That’s what Brooklyn really has going for it: moments of perfectly modulated tone. Whether it’s Ellis’ homesickness, her growing joy and appreciation of the trees in spring wrapping the Brooklyn brownstones in green, or the utterly charming chemistry between her and her Italian beau, Tony (Emory Cohen).

When tragedy forces Ellis to return to Ireland, it’s a little confusing as to why she doesn’t reveal to her friends and family that she has a love back in New York, but if that’s a slight plot issue, it doesn’t spoil the aching sweetness of what happens when she starts to receive the attentions of a hometown fella, Domhnhall Gleeson’s Jim.

Don’t get me wrong, much of the emotional terrain Brooklyn delivers is the usual purview of British TV period dramas, but even amongst those this would stand out for its sterling lyricism. And there’s simply no way Ronan will be ignored at awards time. People are calling her the best actor of her generation, and that work is all here to see.

Brooklyn opens in Halifax on Friday, December 11, 2015


http://tinyurl.com/ozyfc4r

Carsten Knox is a massive, cheese-eating nerd. In the day he works as a journalist in Halifax, Nova Scotia. At night he stares out at the rain-slick streets, watches movies, and writes about what he's seeing.

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Re: Long but Lovely

I literally just settled in and read this before checking your post. This is the newspaper and website produced by the students from the University of York.

I like this part as well:


But, Saoirse is essential to everything here. John Crowley’s direction knows this, the costume and make up work knows this, and critically so does Bélanger. For all that film can do, there is still an inarguable excellence to the power of a human face well acted on screen. Saoirse is one such face. What a gift to Ireland, what a gift to the world that this 21 year old actor has matured so eloquently on screen.

Re: Brooklyn Reviews/Reactions/Substream Magazine….


The Nick Hornby-written ‘Brooklyn’ is quite possibly the best film of 2015

ReviewsFilm Reviewsby James Shotwell - Dec 3, 2015
Brooklyn

Finding a way to transcend the idea of how movies are supposed to look and feel in 2015, Brooklyn offers a timeless tale of love and the many forms it takes that will not soon be forgotten. The script is strong, as is the source material it has been adapted from, and the lead performances from Saoirse Ronan and Emory Cohen could not be more perfectly measured. In a time when it seems every film needs a villain of some kind, Brooklyn has arrived to remind us the greatest journeys are often the most personal ones.

Set in the 1950s, Brooklyn follows an Irish immigrant named Eilis Lacey (Ronan) as she begins a new life thousands of miles from the one she has always known. Her trip is the result of an arrangement by her sister (Fiona Glascott), who remained behind in Irel 1908 and to watch over their widowed mother, and it comes just as Eilis is beginning to feel as if there was no place for her at home. She soon finds work, as well as a place to live, and after a brief bout with homesickness she begins to enjoy her new surroundings.

One night, while escorting a newly immigrated girl to a weekly dance for Irish youth, Eilis meets a young man named Tony (Cohen). The spark between them is almost immediate, and by the time they are walking home together Tony feels it only right to confess that he is, in fact, not Irish. He’s actually Italian, and while he could spend his night at a similar dance for Italian youth he chooses to attend the dance where he met Eilis because he has a thing for Irish girls. This isn’t to say he’s a ladies man, or that anything about him would lead you to believe he had ever successfully swooned a girl of any kind, but he feels so strongly for Eilis from the moment they meet he knows it’s only right she knows what lead to their initial encounter. Ellis admires this kind of honesty, especially from someone who has no real reason to confess anything to someone else they just met, and soon the two begin to date.

Just as life in America is beginning to flow the way Eilis had always been told it would, devastating news from home brings back the homesickness Eilis has only recently felt fade away. The pain and distance are all too much for her to bear, so Eilis makes a decision to return home in order to be with her family. Tony understands her decision, but he fears the time apart will cause her to believe that her time in New York was a mistake, so he makes the rash decision to ask for Eilis’ hand in marriage in the days before her departure. She accepts, they marry, and then she’s gone.

Back in Ireland, Eilis begins to fall for a boy she never even thought about twice before her trip to America. She also finds temporary employment in the field of her dreams, as well as time with her dear mother whom she has greatly missed. It’s all so wonderful and peaceful that Eilis begins to wonder why she ever left, and in time she begins to wonder if she should ever leave again.

Aside from a few minor changes made to simplify the story and provide a more satisfying conclusion, Brooklyn is about as close to being a perfect adaptation as any reader could hope to find in film. Writer Nick Hornby (High Fidelity, About A Boy) has brought Colm Tóibín’s work to the big screen just as it appeared on the page, only now it’s beautifully realized with lush colors and gorgeous costumes. There is heart, romance, comedy and drama to spare, but never too much of anything at any given moment. Filmmaker John Crowley knows how to give viewers just enough to leave them wanting more, and with a near-perfect cast at his disposal the material simply leaps to life.

If Saoirse Ronan doesn’t enter 2016 with a number of Best Actress nominations for her work as Eilis there is no justice in film today. Playing a character like Eilis demands a level of skill and subtle precision that is incredibly rare in film today. She is a woman of few words and many dreams, with ambitions far greater than anyone meeting her would likely assume. At the same time however, she carries guilt from being in a position like no one else in her family has ever experienced. She knows her family only wants for her to be happy, but she fears that allowing herself to feel joy will somehow cause her loved ones to suffer. Ronan understands all of this and conveys it with poise and grace that feels pulled from golden age of cinema.

Emory Cohen, having already established himself as a major-level talent in the minor leagues of indie film, compliments Ronan’s subtle performance with his tough, yet charming portrayal of Tony. His character is the middle child of a working-class Italian family who is constantly trying to prove to the world and himself that he is a man, all while trying to swoon a girl that he knows it out of his league. His intentions are good, as are his actions, and I find it hard to imagine anyone being able to resist falling in love with him before the film comes to an end.

The supporting cast work wonders as well, filling the already bountiful world with even more to enjoy. Jim Broadbent, for example, plays the priest responsible for helping ease Eisel into her new surroundings. He is a gentle, but firm hand in a world where it seems everyone is too busy to stop and help anyone else. There is also the chatty and fiercely christian Mrs. Kehoe, played to perfection by Julie Waters, who does her best to create a sense of family in a home filled with strangers. Small but strong turns like the ones delivered by these actors help propel Brooklyn from good to great without stealing attention from the central narrative, and their success is a result of both the script and performances working just right.

Two-thousand-fifteen has been a year filled with more new movies than practically any other year in the history of cinema, but when one considers the recent titles that will be remembered 20 years from now there are very few films that come to mind. With Brooklyn, this calendar year now has one truly exceptional work of art, and we all have John Crowley to thank. This is the kind of film that reminds you why you first fell in love with cinema. It’s beautiful, fun, quick, engaging, romantic, funny and every positive adjective or descriptive phrase in between. I wouldn’t blame you if you ducked under your seat after the screening you paid to see came to an end and hid there until the next screening began just to experience it all over again. It’s that good, and I think it will only get better with repeat viewings.

If you only see one “awards film” this year, make it Brooklyn.


http://tinyurl.com/nmatc23

Re: great podcast by insession

Its a bit long , but they talk in depth about a bunch of things, including Saoirse's perfomances. One of the guys didn't like the movie that much, but the other two absolutly loved it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vL8PeC-XpSw

Re: great podcast by insession

Thanks. I'll definitely listen too it tonight.

Terrific review….


BROOKLYN IS A SWOONING AND POIGNANT EXPLORATION OF HOME

POSTED BY SCHYLER MARTIN ON DEC 15, 2015 |

Overview: When a tragedy forces a young Irish immigrant back to her country of origin, she must decide whether to stay in the life she once had there or go back to her newfound life in America. Fox Searchlight Pictures; 2015; Rated PG-13; 112 minutes.

A Rich Atmosphere: They say you can’t go home again, but that’s not quite true, is it? You can go home, even after years away. And often you do, and you stay for a bit, and you start to forget all of the reasons you left. I’ve left home many times, and while it’s safe to say that I’ll probably never live in the town I grew up in again, but I’ll still go back from time to time. And every time I know I’ll feel a small, mostly inexplicable tug in my heart pulling me to stay.

That pull of home coupled with the ringing call of a new life is central to Brooklyn. These feelings are deep, hard to explain, and surely tough to represent accurately on screen, but Brooklyn doesn’t miss a beat. Director John Crowley and cinematographer Yves Bélanger have crafted brilliant, sensory atmospheres in which one can easily lose oneself in this film.

Flawless acting enhances the world the film builds. Saoirse Ronan is better than great. She is a breakthrough, star-on-the-rise, unbelievably talented and watchable actress. Emory Cohen is one of the more charming love interests I’ve seen on screen in a long time. And those who know me already know how I feel about Domhnall Gleeson. (Swoon.) He’s consistently grand.

Coming of Age: Brooklyn has largely been marketed as a love story, complete with a requisite triangle. Love does abound in the film, but it’s about so much more than that. Brooklyn is an exploration of self, of choices we all make and struggle with. It’s a coming of age story that emotionally fulfills ten-fold. But it’s not just that Brooklyn is emotionally fulfilling that makes it so great. It’s that it’s real.

The film never falls back on tired sentimentality. Changes and emotional breakthroughs aren’t monumental and sudden as they so often seem to be in movies. Instea b68 d, they’re quiet and thoughtful — expressed through a bright yellow dress and an air of confidence, or a little extra swing in the phenomenally talented Ronan’s step.

Final Thoughts: For anyone who’s ever left home or who’s ever missed it. Anyone who’s ever known that they could go back again, and live in the same town, with most of the same people, but still realize that life couldn’t ever really be the same as it once was. Brooklyn is the movie for you. What a treasure it is to see a poignant and universal dilemma portrayed in such a beautiful way.

Grade: A
(From: Audiences Everywhere)

http://tinyurl.com/oqb54eh

The Express Tribune….


The Express Tribune
Sunday, 20 Dec 2015

Fi b68 lm review: Brooklyn - The home front

By Ally Adnan Published: December 20, 2015

The life of an immigrant is strange. The country that he leaves behind holds his history whereas his future belongs to the new one. It takes a very long time — sometimes decades — to decide which country to call home. It is, invariably, a critical event, powerful but rarely dramatic, and almost always triggered by love that forces the immigrant to decide where he belongs.

The moment takes place in the life of the heroine of Brooklyn towards the end of the film, when she is forced to choose between her past and her future. This is a remarkable scene — powerful, potent and resonant — in a remarkable film. An austere and unadorned adaptation of Colm Tóibín’s 2009 novel, Brooklyn is one of the finest films of the year.

Brooklyn owes its greatness, almost entirely, to the masterful work of five individuals: actor Saoirse Ronan who brings her character alive with a luminous performance; director John Crowley who directs with great skill and precision; writer Nick Hornby who captures the emotional essence of the novel with a trimmed but faithful adaptation; production designer François Séguin who creates a sense of time and period with seemingly effortless accuracy; and casting director Fiona Weir who assembles a perfect ensemble of actors. Romantic, intelligent and engaging, it is a film that explores the sadness and happiness, the sentimentalism and pragmatism and the truth and falsehoods of a life torn between two countries. And, while it has its sad moments, Brooklyn is sublimely inspiring and heartwarming.

Eilis Lacey (Saoirse Ronan), an Irish girl in her early 20s, lives with her mother, Mary Lacey (Jane Brennan), and sister, Rose Lacey (Fiona Glascott), in the town of Enniscorthy, Ireland, circa 1951. She works a couple of days a week for local grocer Miss Kelly (Brid Brennan), a woman full of spite. Eilis’ prospects of finding employment, love and education at home are gloomy. Rose arranges for Eilis to migrate to America. A kind priest, Father Flood (Jim Broadbent), arranges boarding-house accommodation, a job as a salesgirl at the swanky Bartocci’s department store and evening classes in a local college for Eilis in the titular town of Brooklyn.

Here, Eilis is surrounded by a number of well-meaning, if quirky, characters: landlady Madge Kehoe (Julie Walters), a strict disciplinarian with a caustic tongue; a few catty housemates, alternately helpful and envious; and supervisor, Miss Fortini (Jessica Paré), exacting but kind and compassionate. Eilis is homesick and lonely in America. Life changes, when she meets Antonio Fiorello (Emory Cohen), a winsome Italian plumber, at a church dance. The two fall in love over the course of just a few meetings. With Antonio by her side, life takes a decidedly positive turn for E b68 ilis. The two marry each other before Ellis embarks on a trip back to Ireland. Once back in Enniscorthy, she attracts the attention of the eligible Jim Farrell (Domhnall Gleeson) and discovers that she is now able to take care of her aging mother and hold a good job in Enniscorthy. Confounded by the affections of two men, and her love for two countries, Eilis is soon forced to decide between a life in Ireland and one in America.

Saoirse Ronan’s performance — low-key, understated and precise — is powerful and moving. She makes her transformation from a demure young girl to a confident young lady. When confronted with love, she depicts feelings of amazement, confusion and uncertainty with the skills of a master thespian. She employs the minutest touches — a wrinkle on the forehead, a twitching of the lips, a stiffening of the face — to convey the most profound of emotions. Changes in gait, posture, diction and style are used to show changes that take place in her person during the course of the film. No words are used to communicate the emotional turmoil she experiences; only expressions.

Subtlety is, perhaps, the greatest strength of Brooklyn. It demonstrates how restraint, discipline and delicacy can be used effectively to tell deeply moving and passionate tales. Often, less is more. In the case of Brooklyn, it is a whole lot more!

Published in The Express Tribune, Sunday Magazine, December 20th, 2015. (4.5 Stars)


http://tinyurl.com/hb7t3ld



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Re: Brooklyn Reviews/Reactions/Box office r
5b4
eport….

That is a terrific compliment PMG.

From Indiewire:


"Brooklyn" (Fox Searchlight) Week 7
$1,200,000 in 614 theaters (-333); Cumulative: $16,518,000

This Irish emigre tale is quietly itself amassing a decent 5b4 result. And this weekend, though being in somewhat fewer theaters helped its cause, Searchlight can be happy that its PTA actually came in ahead of "Spotlight." That is critical in helping them fight to maintain as many of the best grossing theaters ahead over the next two weeks.


Re: Brooklyn Reviews/Reactions/Box office report….

After reading about fewer theaters showing Brooklyn, I checked my local major theater and was surprised to see them no longer showing it. Brooklyn only had a three-week run. Fortunately, my local independent theater is still showing it, as I planned to watch it again during the holiday time. But the major theater has a better viewing experience. With Fox Searchlight taking a strategic approach with this movie, do you expect the theater count to bounce back soon after Oscar nominations are announced (knock 16d0 -on-wood) as part of their overall plan?

Re: Brooklyn Reviews/Reactions/Box office report….

Exactly. In my area, the film is running through Thursday but is not listed Friday as new titles make their debuts. It had over a one month run, but I guess the strategy is to lay low for a while until the Oscar nominations and then begin expansion once again. I'm going to try and contact the man who writes these pieces for Indiewire in an attempt to get more specifies with regard to the strategy for Brooklyn.

I need to be more patient but occasionally get irritated because I watch boatloads of commercials for these films being released this week and beyond but have seen only one Brooklyn T.V. spot since its general release. I just have to accept where we are from a movie culture standpoint: there are generally smaller or modest audiences for so many excellent films, yet titles are released every year that accumulate hundreds of millions but are the equivalent of junk food for the filmgoing masses. It's just the way things are at this point in time. Why do millions of younger women flock to stuff like Twilight or the mediocre Divergent but refuse to turn out for a sterling film like Brooklyn. Go figure.

Re: Brooklyn Reviews/Reactions/Box office report….

Thanks for the feedback Scast. So then a wider release would be one more thing we can look forward to with the January/February timeframe. Brooklyn has already made 16.5 million domestic and from the sounds of it, a good deal in Ireland and the UK. It'll be fun to see how well Brooklyn can do when Fox Searchlight really puts the pedal to the metal.

I know how you feel about movies these days. To think Finola Dwyer and crew had a tough time (if I remember correctly) getting funding 5b4 together for Brooklyn, requiring the combined funding of the Irish Film Board, the BAI, RTÉ, BBC, Telefilm and the BFI. And even then it still had a tight budget. Yet, every year it seems there's at least one lame movie getting green-lit for a 100+ million-dollar budget. All we can do is be glad and appreciate when movies like Brooklyn get made.

Passionate Brooklyn review!

This review is written with such passion for the film that I just had to post it here. There is an observation by the reviewer of a surprising nature, and if you read the piece in it entirety, I'd like to know if any posters here agree with his view about the presence of Tony earlier than I can recall even after multiple viewings.


Film International
Thinking Film Since 1973

Saturday, December 12th, 2015 | Posted by Matthew Sorrento

Simple, Beautiful Perfection in Brooklyn

By Elias Savada.

It’s interesting that novelist-screenwriter-producer Nick Hornby and director John Crowley previously have been best known in the world of cinema for their boyish works. Hornby wrote the charming novel About a Boy (1998), which became an award-winning comedy film in 2002 that introduced us to rising star Nicholas Hoult. Five years later Crowley won accolades for his film Boy A, a hard-edged working class drama about the rehabilitation and retribution of an ex-con (played by a charismatic Andrew Garfield). Now their resumes are topped by Brooklyn, a poignant coming of age tale about an Irish lassie who finds romance in the New World.

In their new, wondrous collaboration, the graceful passion of love, the awkward innocence of a young immigrant, and a peaceful, subtle comic wit are sculpted by screenwriter Hornby’s adaptation of Irish author Colm Tóibín’s 2009 best-selling novel of the same name. Crowley builds on this substantial blueprint, orchestrating a glorious early 1950s production and wardrobe design (handled by François Séguin and Odile Dicks-Mireaux), weaving in a lilting score by Michael Brook to overlay the poetic images captured by cinematographer Yves Bélanger, and guiding a marvelous cast top-lined by an incandescent performance by Saoirse Ronan and dazzling, authentic supporting turns by Downhill Gleeson, Jim Broadbent, Julie Walters, and a breakthrough acting experience from Emory Cohen (TV’s Smash, 2012-13).

A radiantly pale blue-eyed Eilis Lacey (Ronan) has realized that life in backwater Enniscorthy, Ireland, leaves little opportunity for finding the right place in her life. She’s not content with the male gene pool or her job opportunities there; it’s her older, single sister Rose (Fiona Glascott), an accountant, who is the principal breadwinner for the family, which also consists of their lonely mother Mary (a finely reserved Jane Brennan). Despite the close bonds the red-haired women share, it is decided that the emotionally suffocating Eilis has a better chance of success (in love, in occupation, in life) in New York City.

With the help of an émigré priest, Father Flood (Broadbent, fine, as always), the demure yet resourceful fish-out-of-water has already landed a job before stepping off the boat, as well as standard issue accommodations at a Brooklyn boarding-house ruled by the Mrs. Kehoe (the confidently comic Julie Walters) and populated by some other well-opinionated and quite giddy ladies in their well-appointed bodies. Their evening meals together are funny ramblings about hunting down Mr. Right and what best to wear while swimming on the beach at Coney Island.

The script’s subtle humor first beckons our unsure heroine as she makes her maiden voyage to America. She gets a sassy, take-life-by-the horns roommate (Eva Birthistle) who helps Eilis through a rough night dealing with a disagreement between her stomach and the ship’s singularly disgusting mutton stew. There’s also two mean-spirited girls in an adjoining cabin — with a bathroom between them — who need to be reprimanded. Later in the film, look for a fine round of laughter while watching Eilis enjoy a plate a spaghetti (and the preparations involved) with a rambunctious family of immigrants.

The film’s visual styling showcases a muted, pre-WWII blue, beige, and brown palate in Ireland before morphing (with a blinding white light as Eilis exits the immigration center in slo-mo revelation) into brighter, newer color scheme and a more fashionable appetite as the film enters its bustling New York segment. (The film is a UK/Canada/Ireland co-production, with much of the Big Apple locations shot in Montreal.)

The glamorous department store, Bartocci’s (not unlike the store where Todd Haynes’ Carol, another Oscar contender this year, has its start, also set in 1952), where Eilis is a clerk, is a merry cauldron where she slowly gains social confidence and overcomes a moderate case of homesickness, helped by her refined boss (Mad Men‘s Jessica Paré) and the ever benevolent Father Flood. But her evolution into modern womanhood begins at Berman’s, a corner diner, where, unknown to her (and the viewer), Tony Fiorello (Cohen) sits nearby. This young, well-mannered Italian plumber falls head-over-heels (who wouldn’t) for her, courts her at an Irish dance hall, and even makes a grueling (to him) decision not to jinx things by bringing up any conversation about the national pastime. Of his beloved Brooklyn Dodgers (they were mine, too, back in the day). Don’t want to chance a wild pitch or passed ball in the game of love.

As their relationship depends, everything seems to brighten around them. Their smiles are infectious. You smile. While the film ambles through her growth in New York, with occasional glances back across the ocean, tragic circumstances do eventually call Eilis home during the film’s last half hour, where her resolve to remain true to Tony is amply tested as her old innocent, unsure self reappears and befriends Jim Farrell (Gleeson). All of the town’s close-knit inhabitants seem to be clawing Eilis back from her new found life in America.

I can’t spot a single thing wrong with Brooklyn. An Oscar-caliber package; start betting on victory for Ronan, at the least. Heart-warming, light-hearted, and perfectly poised. Simple. Beautiful. Lovely.

Elias Savada is a movie copyright researcher, critic, craft beer geek, and avid genealogist based in Bethesda, Maryland. He helps program the Spooky Movie International Movie Film Festival, and previously reviewed for Film Threat and Nitrate Online. He is an executive producer of the new horror film German Angst and co-author, with David J. Skal, of Dark Carnival: the Secret World of Tod Browning.


http://tinyurl.com/owjjv7y

Re: Brooklyn review

Well, i finally watched Brooklyn, through a leaked screener, i know i should've waited, but i just couldnt , here are my toughts:

Well, as it was expected, i absolutely loved it!! The whole story felt so real, because of the amazing way Nick Hornby formulated the dialogue, the characters and the relationships. Lost of perfect close-ups to show just how Ellis felt isolated both in her new and old life. Beautiful use of color, costumes and light, scenarios perfectly designed. Great use and no use of the musical score.The supporting cast was really good, I admired Georgina and her self assurance, i laughed with Ma Keough and her giddy boarding house girls, i felt in love with Tony and his devotion to Ellis, i was charmed by Jim, i cried with Rose and Ellis's mother, i despised Nettles Kelly and what a lovely priest Father Flood was. And most important, how terrific Saoirse was, incredibly perfomance! Everything the character was feeling, every tought, i could see it all on her face, but so subtle she was. There was genuily a moment were i felt like an invasor, because i knew so much about this characters toughts and feelings.

About some scenes spoiler!:


- It was perfect how there was no music when Ellis tells her mother she is married, i think many directors would resort to music and make the scene more dramatic, but John pulls away from the melodrama and trusts every emotional bit to the actresses who do an amazing job conveying their characters emotions.

- I know there are quite some people who didn't like much of the confrontation scene between Ellis and Miss Kelly, but i tought it was great how Nick Hornby made it. First Ellis realizing the cons of being in Ireland, then telling Miss Kelly she is Ellis Fiorello and going away without doing one of those superficial and unnatural long speechs.

- The last scene has to be my favorite, i love how Ellis at first is almost ignoring the girl, that is so much like she was at the start of the movie, but then deciding to help her just like she was helped before. " ... you will feel so homesick that you will want to die..."

Overall: I loved it!!!

Re: Brooklyn review

I need to head out Poetswan, so if you respond I'll get back tonight. I have to say your post is beautifully written. I'm very glad you enjoyed the film, but promise me you'll see it on the big screen when give the chance in the near future. BTW, I felt the script was first rate as well. Oh, I didn't notice Tony in the dinner, but I was focused on Saoirse throughout and will look closely when I see the film again.

Re: Brooklyn review

Yes, yes, of course i will see on the Big screen, the first day i will be there. I forgot to mention that like the critics said , i really tought about the old Hollywood romances when watching Ellis and Tony, the way they loved and adored each other, did you tought about it too?

Re: Brooklyn review

Yes, the film is like a throwback to films in earlier decades. One critic felt the film was similar to the common "women pictures" popular in the 1940's.

Tweets continued….

Ever since the debut of Brooklyn, the tweets have been outstanding with incredibly few negatives. Whether the film was playing at a festival or in general release, reactions could be found every day and night. Here are some more recent reactions to Brooklyn:


James Brunt ‏@Brunt__James 3h3 hours ago

Even though Room was tremendous and I may or may not have weeped uncontrollably, Brooklyn is still my favorite film of the year.

Thomas James ‏@thomas13james 4h4 hours ago

The best part of being nocturnal is being a film addict #MoviesForHours #np #Brooklyn

Caroline Bielskis ‏@CarolineB88 7h7 hours ago

.#Brooklyn - beautiful film! Very good acting, sweet story, and I love the nice manners they had back then. :)
#SaoirseRonan


Welcome To New York ‏@TwiHardMonster 7h7 hours ago

So Brooklyn is a very beautifully made, well done film!!! The cast is brilliant, I so hope #SaoirseRonan wins this year !!!!!! 👑

Mark Ciarrocchi ‏@CiarrocchiM 11h11 hours ago

After seeing the blockbusters at the theatre it was #brooklyn that won me over! Excellent film.

Lydia Hejka ‏@lydiahejka 14h14 hours ago

Just saw the film Brooklyn...it was sweet/ funny/ sad (I only cried 3 times bc I'm #tough) and I hope it wins all the awards.[

Go see it.


Ben Trovato ‏@CCFather 17h17 hours ago

Just been to see Brooklyn with the girls: good to see the Church portrayed so positively in a film. Good priests doing good work.

Bettye Rainwater ‏@bettyerainwater 19h19 hours ago

A really nice movie. Water leaked out of my eyes from the first minute to the last — watching Brooklyn (film) at...

~Maria~ ‏@OneStyleataTime 19h19 hours ago

Thanks @ImAlexMiranda for reading my comment! Glad you also enjoyed the film 'Brooklyn'. Worthy of top accolades this year. @HuffPostLive

wanggo gallaga ‏@wanggo_g 21h21 hours ago

I loved Brooklyn. Soarsie Ronan has a magical screen presence. That film wasn't easy to pull off.

The killing levels were really high for me.


Nichola Vo ‏@always_rambling 1d1 day ago

Brooklyn is an amazing film; I laughed, I cried and I felt all the emotions. Beautiful story played our exquisitely - I want to rematch!

Mario Leon ‏@bembacolora Dec 27

Saw the film #Brooklyn tonight. Wow, that was good!

marilyngster ‏@marilyngster Dec 27 Salt Lake City, UT

Brooklyn, a jewel of a film. Saw it today at the Broadway. @SaltLakeFilmSoc


New review….


Golden Globe nominee Saoirse Ronan exceptional in 'Brooklyn'

December 30, 2015

“Brooklyn,” a thoroughly engaging new drama, is exactly the kind of film that Hollywood should make on a regular basis. Director John Crowley (“Inte 238 rmission”) and his talented cast tell the story of a young woman rediscovering herself in a land far from home. It’s a simple and timeless story of love and family that really hits home.

The amazing Saoirse Ronan stars as Eilis, an Irish girl who can’t find a career in her native Ireland. Thanks to a priest in America (Jim Broadbent), Eilis makes the long journey to New York where a new job and life await her. Unfortunately, her absence puts more pressure on her older sister Rose (Fiona Glascott), the only one at home caring for their mothe b68 r.

Homesick at first, Eilis settles in and meets an Italian boy named Tony (Emory Cohen). Their relationship changes the young girl’s perspective about life in America. Though she loves Brooklyn and her boyfriend, she still has her roots in Ireland and cannot ignore these.

In her career, Saoirse Ronan has accumulated an impressive list of credits, with “Brooklyn” being her finest performance to date. The 21-year-old actress appeared in critically-acclaimed pieces such as “Atonement” and science fiction fare like “City of Ember” and “The Host.” Her work in “Brooklyn” also has been honored with a Golden Globe nomination.

Ronan takes her character on a journey from quiet, obedient girl to confident young woman. She elicits tears and laughter from the audience while dealing with both seasickness and an aching heart. Her relationship with Tony feels authentic and real, especially when she has dinner with his family for the first time.


Julie Walters has less screen time than Ronan, but she makes quite an impression as Mrs. Kehoe, the woman who runs a Brooklyn boardinghouse for young women. As the no-nonsense landlady, Walters is as impressive here as she was in the “Harry Potter” franchise. She obviously admires and cares for her residents, but she won’t brook any nonsense.

As the men who love Eilis, Domhnall Gleeson and Emory Cohen turn in fine performances as well. Cohen brings a good-hearted sensibility to Tony, the Brooklyn boy who adores the Irish immigrant and would do anything for her. Gleeson’s Jim Farrell represents home and a comfortable life back in Ireland, something Eilis finds very tempting.

Though it lacks expensive special effects and robots, “Brooklyn” is an exceptional movie and one that could represent itself quite well during awards season. More films should embrace this level of quality and storytelling.

“Brooklyn,” rated PG-13 for a scene of sexuality and brief strong language, currently is playing in limited release.

http://tinyurl.com/ph94obb

By: Steven Bryan (St Louis Comedy Movie Examiner)

Re: Passionate Brooklyn review!

Did he mean that Tony was at the dinner!? I really don't remember that.

Re: Schmoes Know review

Re: Schmoes Know review

Good review. Too bad the other guy didn't see the film.

Re: Schmoes Know review

And it's too bad the other guy couldn't pronounce her name, but he gets points for screwing it up three times with such conviction each time.
None of that namby-pamby deer in the headlights Dennis Quaid "Sheshah" nonsense.

Re: Schmoes Know review

It'll keep happening until she's a household name. However, there is no excuse for those in the film industry in any capacity to not get her name correct.

Post deleted

This message has been deleted.

Year end stuff….

The Examiner.com critics who are all over the country got together for their best in film. There are many categories, but here is one critics take on his favorite performance:


From: Brian Zitzelman: Saoirse Ronan as Eilis in Brooklyn gets my nod. It is a performance of deceiving simplicity, with humor, tenderness and great grief laced into its heart. There was a lot of talk last year about Boyhood depicting a boy growing up and becoming a man literally in front of our eyes. Ronan manages to convey that feeling in two hours, even if she probably only physically aged a couple of months. The transformation of innocent, confused young woman to confident, proud adult is quite a feat to behold in Ronan’s capable hands.

Mr. Zitzelman writes for The Seattle Movie Examiner.

Brooklyn ensemble gets some love from The Film Experience….

New review….

Brooklyn is now up to 178 fresh out of 181 total reviews on RT. Enjoy it because one doesn't often see a 98% rated film with nearly 200 counted reviews. Here is a new one:


Brooklyn
Review by Robert Denerstein
published November 24, 2015

Eilis Lacey spends a good deal of Brooklyn, the movie derived from a 2009 novel by Colm Toibin, in a disoriented state. A girl from Enniscorthy, County Wexford, Eilis travels to the U.S. in 1951 after her older sister Rose arranges for her to leave Ireland.

Eilis makes the trip, but it is not yet her journey. And that’s the basis of a coming-of-age movie that embraces an old-fashioned style that files the roughest edges off its story, but allows its central performance to carry us along with it.

Brooklyn focuses on young Eilis, beautifully played by Saoirse Ronan, familiar to moviegoers from movies such Atonement, The Lovely Bones and Hanna.

Ronan inhabits her character so thoroughly, it seems as if we’re watching a flower break ground, stretch to meet the sun’s warmth and eventually bloom. Without affectation or undue showiness, Ronan manages to carry a movie that spans the distance between two very different worlds.

When Eilis arrives in the U.S., she takes up residence in a boarding house run by Mrs. Keough (Julie Walters), a good-hearted woman who also happens to have a dictatorial streak when it comes to the women who live in her home.
Gradually, Eilis begins to encounter the new life into which she has been thrust. She’s helped by a local priest who cares about her welfare and who is portrayed by Jim Broadbent without a trace of cynicism.

Eventually, Eilis lands a job as a clerk at a department store and begins studying accounting. She also meets Tony (Emory Cohen), a young Italian man who works as a plumber but who — along with his bothers — hopes to start a construction business that will relocate his family to Long Island.
As the story develops, Ronan begins to taste the freedom and sense of possibility that her sister (Fiona Glascott) so ardently wishes for her. She even learns to hold her own at the table with other women who board with Mrs. Keough.

Eventually, Eilis learns that Rose has passed away. Before Eilis returns to Ireland to comfort her grieving mother, Tony insists that they marry. He wants to make sure that she’ll come back to him.
Eilis agrees, but we don’t know exactly how committed she is to this marriage; she’s still living her sister’s dream, not her own.

Back in Ireland, Eilis begins to see a side of life she never experienced while growing up.
Instead of the world narrowing, it suddenly seems to be opening. Not knowing that Eilis is married, one of the town’s bachelors (Domhnall Gleeson) begins to pursue her. She lands a part-ti da0 me job, and comforts a mother who has known her share of grief.

Obviously, Eilis eventually must make up her mind about whether to remain in Ireland or return to the U.S. and resume the life that seemed to offer her so much.

Director John Crowley must have sensed that Ronan could keep the movie on track, so he supports her with nostalgic period design and allows the story to unfold without undue fuss. Nick Hornby’s script is both economical and respectful of its characters.

Well-cast and nicely appointed, Brooklyn might be one of the least cynical movies of the year, an engagingly wide-eyed look at a world in which a young woman learns that she has something to say about the way her life will unfold.

The movie’s modesty and Ronan’s lovely performance make it a pleasure to watch.


http://tinyurl.com/ja7vbnx

For 27 years, Robert Denerstein was the film critic at The Rocky Mountain News. Read more of Robert's reviews at Denerstein Unleashed.

Some interesting tweets….


Ariel Shavonne
‏@mermaidgal24

@davekarger Can Saoirse Ronan win Best Actress?

1:23 PM - 5 Jan 2016

Dave Karger ‏@davekarger 4h4 hours ago

@mermaidgal24 If Brooklyn has a strong showing overall, yes. Wouldn't that be amazing?

mia farrowVerified account ‏@MiaFarrow 12m12 minutes ago

Brooklyn the movie is wonderful. Eac 2000 h performance is true - and Saoirse Ronan is brilliant

Audience member review….

This one is from RT:


Super Reviewer

Glenn G½ November 27, 2015

LUCKY CHARMED - My Review of BROOKLYN (4 1/2 Stars)

I'm not familiar with director John Crowley's previous work, but if the stellar, emotionally overpowering BROOKLYN is any indication, then he's definitely worth investigating. It doesn't hurt that Nick Hornby wrote the screenplay based on a book by Colm Tóibín, as Hornby is no stranger to connecting with audiences via ABOUT A BOY, AN EDUCATION, and WILD. It's also a huge bonus to have, without a doubt, one of the best young actresses of her (or any) generation in Saoirse Ronan (ATONEMENT, THE LOVELY BONES), who at 21 years old can not only carry a movie, but sweep you away with such quiet skill and subtlety. If anyone working today reminds me of a young Meryl Streep in looks and talent, it's her.

Mix all of that together to present an equal parts immigration and love story, and you get BROOKLYN, a simple, no-nonsense, old school tale that had me not just weeping, but straight up bawling for most of its running time. It may not be the best movie of the year, but it's hands down one of the best romances I've ever seen. Ronan plays Eilis, a young woman in a small Irish town who lives with her mother and sister. Wanting a better life than that of a whipping girl to the town Ogre's shop owner, Miss Kelly (a memorable Brid Brennan), Eilis gets a sponsored trip to America to start anew. Leaving her family behind presents the aching dramatic tension of this story, as well as her arduous trip across the ocean. On board, her bunkmate, a veteran of such crossings, teaches her how to properly assimilate into 1952 America.

Upon arrival, her sponsor, Father Flood (Jim Broadbent) finds her an upscale department store job and a boarding house run by Mrs. Kehoe (Julie Walters, who has a table pounding great time with her many quotable lines). MAD MEN's Jessica Paré, in the snooty Parker Posey role as Eilis' new boss, manages to bring empathy to a somewhat bitchy role. Short on true Brooklyn atmosphere, the film, however, gets the emotions just right of a stranger in a strange land. Crowley knows how to use silence, glances, and breathing room in scenes to bring real feelings to the surface. Ellis is a strong yet observant character who can only contain her emotions for so long before they erupt, and I erupted right along with her. Cinematographer Yves Bélanger, who kept his camera much more alive in WILD and DALLAS BUYERS CLUB, tends towards visceral, sweeping grandeur here, and appropriately so. Whether it's the musty views of a dark Irish street at night or the technicolor splendor of a crowded Coney Island beach, this is dreamy perfection. Also of note is the spot-on costume design by Odile Dicks-Mireaux and the just-right production design by François Séguin. The pneumatic tubes in the department store are just one great detail we get to savor.

More joy comes in the form of Tony (a star making performance from Emory Cohen), an Italian plumber who meets Eilis when he crashes an Irish mixer. Their love story is what makes this movie soar beyond all expectations. I can't recall the last time I witnessed a film where the puppy love and unbridled adoration just oozes off the screen. Cohen's sparkling eyes tell the whole story of what falling in love looks like. To say this pair has chemistry is an understatement in all its whooshy, gooey, innocent splendor. These two characters simply love being together, and the considerate, present, gentle tone of Cohen's performance redefines "winning". When is the last time you saw a film where the male protagonist rushes to wait outside a girl's school just so he can escort her home? Or when his declaration of love is done with such delicacy? I don't know if I cried because I was alone and dateless when I saw this film, or if I knew I was witnessing something so rare and pure, but the courtship scenes hit me in the gut.

Of course complications get in the way of the relationship when unexpected events dictate Eilis' temporary (possibly permanent) return to Ireland. Here, we're treated to one heartbreaking scene after another, a pile-on many may find insufferable, but I found to be truthful. Virtually unable to escape her tribe whether in Ireland or her U.S. boarding house, Eilis finds herself at a crossroads.

More than a love story, BROOKLYN is about figuring out your identity in life. Through Ronan's perfectly calibrated performance, we see Eilis change bit by bit. Introducing her Irish friends to her new culture, she meets another kind, young man, Jim (Domhnall Gleeson) who may impact the tough decisions that lie ahead. Ronan, Cohen, and Gleeson know what movie they're making, all of whom are unafraid of the gentle vulnerability in the script and direction. A special mention must be made for James DiGiacomo, who plays Tony's little brother Frankie. Stealing every moment with hilarious Italian hand gestures and direct, succinct comic timing, DiGiacomo feels like the kind of performer who will grow up to snag Don Rickles' career.

Late in the film, there's a beautiful bookend to an earlier sequence that speaks to the generous loving heart of this movie. By paying kindness forward, by passing along knowledge and experience, BROOKLYN reveals a true American spirit. It's one we don't see very often anymore, particularly during a time where we don't always welcome newcomers with open arms. We may never again see an era as guileless as the kind depicted in this strong, lovely film, so go as a reminder of what true decency looks like. Go for Ronan's Oscar-worthy performance. That almost final shot of her standing, waiting, and posed with an iconic confidence gives you a visual, final gut bunch, guaranteed to melt even the coldest of hearts.


Re: Audience member review….

Yes! Someone finally noticed that Saoirse physically resembles Meryl!!

Re: Brooklyn mentioned on the Howard Stern Show

Well count Howard Stern as another person who is enamored with Saoirse. Howard and Robin were discussing the upcoming Oscars and Howard said he loved "Brooklyn", thinks/wants Saoirse to win the best actress award, and said she is the next Meryl Streep. Pretty high praise, Also Robin said she "has been watching her for a while" and mentioned her role in The Lovely Bones. Howard had no idea how to pronounce her name and in classic Howard humor poked fun and tried a few different ways to pronounce... said Sushi at one point....

This was on the Tuesday Jan 19th show during the 6am hour and they mentioned the movie again later in the show during the news.

Re: Brooklyn mentioned on the Howard Stern Show

I never would've expected to read a post title like this on Saoirse's board, but given the fact that he has a huge audience, the mention or two is great news because the film and her performance in particular was exposed to many more people.

Review from Grand Forks Herald….


CATHERINE KRUMMEY: 'Brooklyn' one of 2015's best films

By Catherine Krummey Today at 6:15 a.m.

"Brooklyn" may just be one of the best movies of the decade.

The film is being widely promoted as centering around a love triangle between Eilis (Saoirse Ronan), a young Irish woman who moves to Brooklyn in pursuit of a better life in the 1950s; Tony (Emory Cohen), an Italian-American plumber she meets and falls in love with in America; and Jim (Domhnall Gleeson), an Irish rugby player she meets when she returns to Ireland to handle a family emergency.

Yes, Eilis feels romantic inclinations toward both men, but "Brooklyn" is a lot more than a simple love-triangle story. It is about growing up, figuring out your life and dealing with making hard choices—because of this, it feels remarkable modern, as if it could just as easily be set in 2016.

Many of the film's strengths center on the performance by Ronan.

She came into the limelight in 2007 f 5b4 or her standout supporting performance alongside Keira Knightley and James McAvoy in "Atonement." She even received an Oscar nomination at the age of 14 for the role. Since then, she has continued to impress in films such as "The Lovely Bones," "Hanna" and "The Grand Budapest Hotel."

She rightfully received her second Academy Award nomination for performance in "Brooklyn," which calls on her to stir up a wide range of emotions in the film's two hours.

Ronan appears in almost every scene in the film, and it is therefore on her shoulders to get the audience to go on the film's emotional journey. She is expert-level successful in portraying Eilis' quiet strength without needing a line of dialogue. Some of the best scenes in "Brooklyn" are her reaction shots, with her emotions stirring just below the surface.


As the two love interests, Cohen and Gleeson are both equally as charming and are well-developed characters. British character actors Jim Broadbent and Julie Walters also turn out great supporting performances in "Brooklyn."

The depth "Brooklyn" is able to achieve can be attributed to much more than its performances, though, from the storytelling (direction by John Crowley, screenplay by Nick Hornby—based on the novel by Colm Toibin) to the superb visuals, including the cinematography (Yves Belanger) and gorgeous vintage costumes (Odile Dicks-Mireaux).

Following last week's column on t 16d0 he Oscar snubs, I can say the Academy got it right with "Brooklyn." It is a well-rounded film and definitely deserving of its Best Picture nomination at this year's Academy Awards.

BROOKLYN

Four out of five stars.

Time: 1:51


http://tinyurl.com/zgaydfc

Analysis of Carol and Brooklyn….

Having seen both films, check out this as it contains an intelligent analysis of the two films:

http://tinyurl.com/hx9mbec

Re: Analysis of Carol and Brooklyn….

Great Analysis!

Re: Analysis of Carol and Brooklyn….

It is well thought out and presented. The two films are quite different despite taking place in the same decade.

I just saw this tweet:


Gael-Kid ‏@Kat_Manica 2h2 hours ago

The ad for Brooklyn so frequently and on many platforms, that I'm convinced I've seen the film. 💄👙👒💍


I haven't seen any Brooklyn ads recently. Has anyone out there been exposed to these ads?

Sydney Morning Herald….


Brooklyn review: Saoirse Ronan shines in moving adaptation of Colm Toibin novel

February 7, 2016 - 12:15AM

Craig Mathieson
Film, music and TV critic

BROOKLYN
M, 112 minutes, opens February 11
Director: John Crowley Stars: Saoirse Ronan, Emory Cohen, Domhnall Gleeson, Jim Broadbent
★★★★

It wouldn't be inaccurate to describe Brooklyn, a small and astutely observed drama about a young woman's disorientating move from 1950s Ireland to the United States, as a work laced with nostalgia. But John Crowley's film, built around a remarkably evocative lead performance by the Academy Award-nominated Saoirse Ronan, doesn't just look back wistfully at the 5b4 past, it also transcends the period setting with powerfully timeless questions: Where do I belong? What can I make of my life?

Like so many of her compatriots, Eilis Lacey (Ronan) is leaving her Irish hometown of Enniscorthy to cross the Atlantic. It is 1951 and there is little employment, let alone opportunity, to be had, and it has been decided, as much by her older sister Rose (Fiona Glascott) as Eilis (pronounced Ay-lish), that will she will move to New York. Immigration here isn't a brutal necessity but it's nonetheless stark, and if Eilis feels burdened by expectations, others see her escaping her widowed mother.

At a local dance before her departure, Eilis momentarily pauses by herself, and you realise she is trying to remember this quiet and sometimes drab world, because memories are more important than anything she might pack. Moving to another country is not something lightly done, it is more akin to going into exile – communicating by letter with home, not a single relative or acquaintance to call on.

The film observes Eilis' pain upon arrival in Brooklyn, where she fetches up in a boarding house run by the no-nonsense Mrs Keogh (Julie Walters), as homesickness and loneliness crash down upon her like waves, but it never wallows. Eilis is smart and dedicated, working as a department store clerk by day and studying bookkeeping by night with the aid of a kindly parish priest, Father Flood (Jim Broad 16d0 bent). She sticks it out, and you can't help but be invested in her struggle.

It helps immeasurably that Saoirse Ronan can detail intricate emotional divides with a fleeting acknowledgment and heartfelt gaze. The 21-year-old was always an exceptional child actor, particularly in 2007's Atonement and 2011's Hanna, but the otherworldliness conveyed by pale, piercing eyes has matured into something richer. Many of the moments, good and bad, that Eilis experiences are familiar, but Ronan captures how they felt when first experienced.

That eventually includes the attention of Tony Fiorello (Emory Cohen), an Italian-American plumber who falls in a serious way for Eilis. Played by Cohen with a lovestruck, masculine presence that expands on the innocent edge of Marlon Brando's performances from that era (particularly 1954's On the Waterfront), Tony gives Eilis a focus – the first thing they share is just enriching conversation.

At one point they catch a session of Singin' in the Rain, and on the walk home Tony replays Gene Kelly's joy, leaping onto a lamppost. It's a minor moment, a speck in the relationship's formation, and Crowley is wise enough not to emphasise it. The filmmaker, whose last feature was the ho-hum 2013 London thriller Closed Circuit, makes the camera unobtrusive, but he misses very little.

It's only when Eilis is suddenly recalled to Ireland that you appreciate just how much she's grown and changed – the yellow dress she wears feels like an act of sedition – and that's what attracts an eligible local lad, Jim Farrell (Domhnall Gleeson), to her. Eilis has a glow and maturity that attracts the bashful Jim, and the two countries and their respective suitors make for a tidy but nonetheless compelling choice.

The film walks a fine line in that the conservative 1950s society Eilis lives in is all she knows: she fully expects to meet a man, get married and start a family. Unlike Cate Blanchett's character in Carol, her desire doesn't force her outside the lines. But Eilis never merely gives her assent, and there's a terrific through line of female comrades, from an older cabin mate on the voyage over to her formidable boss (Jessica Pare), who help the expatriate navigate America's unwritten rules.

As he did with 2009's An Education, Nick Hornby has penned a first-rate adaptation, here warm and drily witty. Colm Toibin's novel has been rendered as a deeply felt coming-of-age story, where anguish is as prominent as affection. When Tony takes Eilis out to the fields of Long Island, pitching her on the married life they might lead together, you can see what he's describing as readily as Eilis can. Brooklyn, like Eilis, makes much of her life.


http://tinyurl.com/jd2rqr3

ABC Local (Australia)….


CJ JOHNSON REVIEWS BROOKLYN

Tuesday, February 2, 2016
by CJ Johnson

4.5 STARS

Romantic, moving, embracing and thoroughly old-fashioned, Brooklyn is a gorgeous film centered by a major performance by Saoirse Ronan, who is making no mistakes in fulfilling the promise she showed when she received her first Oscar nomination, for Best Supporting Actress, for Atonement, in 2007, when she was thirteen years old.

Now she's nominated for Best Actress for Brooklyn, and, were Brie Larson not the favorite for Room, it would have to be Ronan's to lose. She carries this terrific picture, appearing in almost every scene, and at times director John Crowley simply frames her face in full close-up, in silent contemplation, and lets her eyes - and, thus, her inner life - let you know everything you need.

Ronan plays Eilis (pronounced Aylish), a young woman for whom there seem to be no job prospects in he 5b4 r native Ireland. A priest in America sponsors her to travel there, and she takes a passage to Brooklyn, where she learns to overcome homesickness, learn a profession, and open up her heart to a young man (an amazing turn by Emory Cohen).

There are other performers in the film - Julie Walters is wonderful, just wonderful, as the head of a small boarding house for young women in which Eilis lives, and so-hot-right-not Domhnall Gleeson gives a subtle and dignified performance - but I cannot over-emphasize the degree to which Ronan bears the weight of this fine movie and is primarily responsible for its success. Just as Crowley, in every way, unashamedly uses the romantic filmmaking language of the fifties, so too does his movie embrace its own nature as an old-school "star vehicle". It lives or dies on Ronan's performance, and it definitely lives, with energy and beauty and grace. Nick Hornby has done a brilliant job of adapting Colm Toibin's novel, and all the art departments have done a sterling job in actualizing an Ireland and Brooklyn of the 1950s but also of the romantic mind. A stunner.


http://tinyurl.com/zxvn634

ABC Local (Australia)….


CJ JOHNSON REVIEWS BROOKLYN

Tuesday, February 2, 2016
by CJ Johnson

4.5 STARS

Romantic, moving, embracing and thoroughly old-fashioned, Brooklyn is a gorgeous film centered by a major performance by Saoirse Ronan, who is making no mistakes in fulfilling the promise she showed when she received her first Oscar nomination, for Best Supporting Actress, for Atonement, in 2007, when she was thirteen years old.

Now she's nominated for Best Actress for Brooklyn, and, were Brie Larson not the favorite for Room, it would have to be Ronan's to lose. She carries this terrific picture, appearing in almost every scene, and at times director John Crowley simply frames her face in full close-up, in silent contemplation, and lets her eyes - and, thus, her inner life - let you know everything you need.

Ronan plays Eilis (pronounced Aylish), a young woman for whom there seem to be no job prospects in her native Ireland. A priest in America sponsors her to travel there, and she takes a passage to Brooklyn, where she learns to overcome homesickness, learn a profession, and open up her heart to a young man (an amazing turn by Emory Cohen).

There are other performers in the film - Julie Walters is wonderful, just wonderful, as the head of a small boarding house for young women in which Eilis lives, and so-hot-right-not Domhnall Gleeson gives a subtle and dignified performance - but I cannot over-emphasize the degree to which Ronan bears the weight of this fine movie and is primarily responsible for its success. Just as Crowley, in every way, unashamedly uses the romantic filmmaking language of the fifties, so too does his movie embrace its own nature as an old-school "star vehicle". It lives or dies on Ronan's performance, and it definitely lives, with energy and beauty and grace. Nick Hornby has done a brilliant job of adapting Colm Toibin's novel, and all the art departments have done a sterling job in actualizing an Ireland and Brooklyn of the 1950s but also of the romantic mind. A stunner.


http://tinyurl.com/zxvn634

Fine review from New Zealand….


The Aucklander

Movie Review: Brooklyn

By Katie Shevlin

3:12 PM Tuesday Feb 16, 2016

An adaptation of the novel by Colm Tóibín, Brooklyn is the tale of an Irish emigrant girl "away" to America in the 50s.

Opening on a bleak evening in County Wexford, director John Crowley quickly establishes the claustrophobia of small-town Ireland that Eilis Lacey is leaving behind for exciting, bustling Brooklyn.

For the first few months of her American life Eilis battles terrible homesickness, a feeling that is both alleviated and worsened by letters from her sister Rose.

The isolation Eilis feels is palpable and it is a relief for the audience when she meets Tony, an Italian American who allows her to begin letting go of the past and embrace her new surroundings.

When tragedy strikes Eilis is pulled back to Ireland - thanks in no small way to a dose of good old-fashioned Catholic guilt - and must decide between two places and the futures that each could provide.

The cast of Brooklyn is virtually flawless but it is a sensational Saoirse Ronan in the lead role who particularly shines, managing to depict a character with both delicate vulnerability and steely resolve.

There is a moment early in the film where the camera rests on Ronan's face for around 30 seconds (an eternity in screen time), during which she remains absolutely captivating - no easy feat for an actor.

Coming a close second is a scene-stealing Julie Walters as the landlady of Eilis' boarding house in New York, perfectly exemplifying unapologetic Irish matter-of-factness, and her deadpan one-liners at the dinner table provide much of the film's humour.

Where Crowley really excels is in drawing the audience into Eilis' internal struggle and his approach imbues the familiar story of immigration with a fresh and original quality.

The result is a profoundly moving period drama that beautifully illustrates the struggle between the part in all of us that is tied to home and the part that wants more from life.

Brooklyn
Directed by John Crowley


http://tinyurl.com/hjxyuf3

Re: Fun review

You can tell he got really passionated with Brooklyn: http://youtu.be/PCR27i0qoe4

Re: Fun review

That was really good. He identifies the two, main strengths of the film as well. Saoirse and the script. Everything else is so good and is fitted together seamlessly, but what elevates Brooklyn are those two elements.
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