It’s hard not to love Belfast, the coming of age drama that follows young Buddy (Jude Hill) and his family through political upheaval and violence in Northern Ireland in the 1960’s. Written and directed by Kenneth Branagh, the film is notable for its excellent black and white cinematography, some wonderfully subdued but powerful performances, and its coverage of interesting historical terrain.
Ultimately, Belfast is a film about how family works, and it has a lot to say on the subject. A surprisingly large number of Buddy’s kin receive their dues in nuanced characterization, thanks to Branagh’s wise yet emotional screenwriting. By movie’s end we’ve been presented with what feels like a complete portrait of three Irish generations.
I found especially compelling Buddy’s older brother, who receives comparatively little screen time but whom Buddy always seems to be watching with great interest. He’s more introverted than Buddy and tends to react sourly to Buddy’s antics, but he appears to have an inner strength and resilience that Buddy initially lacks. Slowly, though, Buddy comes to emulate his brother, such that by the end of the film Buddy has become far more stoic toward the chaos around him, in part by following his brother’s example.
In fact, Buddy seems to absorb something from each of his loving family by movie’s end, and this may be where the interest lies in re-watching: how does the nature of Buddy’s personal growth trace back to interactions and observations with his separate family members?
While the bond of family may be powerful, Branagh shows us that it can be disrupted by a community out of control. In my favorite scene, Buddy is coerced into joining a gang of looters who destroy a supermarket. When he proudly returns home with a stolen box of cereal, clueless about what he’s done, his Ma (Caitriona Balfe) is having none of it and drags him back to return the stolen item.
In a typical film, this episode might end there, presented as an admirable and humorous example of tough parenting—but not in this one, as the anti-Catholic looters won’t allow the mother and son to return the cereal, and instead the situation becomes gravely dangerous. The wild spectacle of Buddy’s Ma attempting and failing to teach a traditional moral lesson amidst a backdrop of viciousness and amorality makes this moment stick in the mind long afterward.
It’s useful to compare Belfast to Jojo Rabbit (review here), the Best Picture nominee from two years ago with a nearly identical premise. Belfast, of course, is the better film by light years, but it sometimes veers too close to the unwelcome whimsy of its predecessor. For instance, Buddy, like Jojo before him, is a bit too precious, his character needlessly losing some believability in the name of cuteness. And also like Jojo, Buddy has an extravagantly tolerant, sagelike, speechmaking parent: his Pa (Jamie Dornan). A deus ex machina moment at Belfast’s climax and the Van Morrison soundtrack that hints at fun that nobody appears to be having, recall Jojo Rabbit by sapping gravitas from key sequences.
Nevertheless, the craft of Belfast bolsters it to the cream of this year’s crop, and if it wins the Oscar for Best Picture, as some predict it will, it’ll be a far worthier choice than last year’s Nomadland or even the prior year’s Parasite. I’m skeptical it has the power of a permanent classic, because, for all its great insight into family dynamics, it can’t quite look at its historical material head on: it retreats to a child’s ignorance when convenient, substituting feel-good lessons for the authentic images—however ghastly—we deserve. Branagh’s Belfast can be mentioned in the same sentence as Schindler’s List (1993), but Spielberg showed us his atrocities, whereas in Belfast we only hear of them.
Are children are too innocent to see death and gore? No. The slightly too innocent one, sadly, is Branagh.
— Jim Andersen
For more old reviews, see my rankings of the 2020 Best Picture nominees.