The merciless sisters

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Movie
German title The merciless sisters
Original title The Magdalene Sisters
Country of production Great Britain , Ireland
original language English
Publishing year 2002
length 114 minutes
Age rating FSK 12
JMK 14
Rod
Director Peter Mullan
script Peter Mullan
production Frances Higson
music Craig Armstrong
camera Nigel Willoughby
cut Colin Monie
occupation

The Magdalene Sisters ( The Magdalene Sisters ) is a British-Irish film drama by Peter Mullan from the year 2002 .

action

The film is set in Ireland in the 1960s and describes the lives of three young women who are put in a Magdalene home by their families : Margaret has been raped by her cousin. Bernadette , who grows up in an orphanage, has been caught flirting several times. Rose gave birth to an illegitimate child; her parents no longer want to speak to her, her father and a priest force her to put the child up for adoption.

At the same time, all three young women were taken into the care of the nuns in the Magdalenen Convent , which was directed by Sister Bridget. Rose gets the new name Patricia from Sister Bridget, which is her company name, which she has to use from now on, since another inmate is already called Rose.

The girls work in the monastery laundry. Even the smallest offenses such as objections or contact with outsiders are severely punished. Among other things, their hair is cut off or they are beaten with sticks and leather straps. One of the girls, Una, escapes, but is brought back by his father. Una's father insults her and the other girls as whores .

The nuns constantly mock and humiliate the girls. Crispina tries several times to take her own life. Some time later, Margaret observes a priest forcing her to perform sexual acts.

While Margaret is being picked up by her brother after four years, an old inmate dies in the monastery. Then Rose (or Patricia) and Bernadette decide to escape, which they also manage. They look for Bernadette's cousin, who owns a hair salon and gives them shelter, clothes and money. The film ends with the fictional résumé of the women: Rose (or Patricia) flees to Liverpool , marries there and has two daughters. She found her son in 1996, 33 years after he was taken from her. She remained a devout Catholic until her death in 1998. Bernadette finds work and training in her cousin's hairdressing salon, moves to Scotland some time later and opens her own hairdressing salon there, and after three divorced marriages now lives alone. Crispina (or rather Harriet) died of anorexia in 1971 at the age of only 24 in a psychiatric institution . She had long since gone mad. Margaret became a primary school teacher in Donegal. Today she is the deputy rector. She never married and remains childless.

Reviews

James Berardinelli wrote on ReelViews that the film is considered anti-Catholic, which is partly true. The film does not show a balanced, three-dimensional image of the nuns. The story told is "powerful" and "disturbing". The film is worth seeing because it is well done and encourages the viewer to think and empathize.

The lexicon of international films wrote that the film was a “story told according to authentic conditions from the perspective of the captured girls”, which creates a “clear enemy image” in the form of the order and the “restrictive society”. The film is "staged and played in a virtuoso manner".

Awards

The film was nominated for the European Film Awards for Best Film in 2002 . Peter Mullan won the Golden Lion at the 2002 Venice Film Festival . In 2003 he won awards from the Nantucket Film Festival and the Los Angeles IFP / West Film Festival . Peter Mullan was nominated for a BAFTA Award in 2003 for the screenplay ; Frances Higson and Peter Mullan were nominated for the Alexander Korda Award for Best British Film . The cast won the 2003 British Independent Film Award , the film for Best British Independent Film and Peter Mullan for the screenplay were nominated for the same award.

Peter Mullan was nominated in 2004 for the César , Directors Guild of Great Britain Award and the Independent Spirit Award . He and the film for Best Picture of the Year won the 2004 London Critics Circle Film Award .

The film won the Political Film Society Award for Human Rights in 2004 and was nominated for the Political Film Society Award for Exposé .

background

The film is the theatrical version of an Irish television film (also broadcast in 2002) called Sinners . The film characters are fictional, but the circumstances described are not. Around 30,000 girls worked in such Magdalen homes in Ireland ; In 1996 the last home was closed.

The film was shot in Dumfries ( Scotland ). It had its world premiere on August 30, 2002 at the Venice International Film Festival ; on September 12, 2002 it was screened at the Toronto International Film Festival . The film grossed approximately $ 4.9 million in US cinemas ; the other countries grossed around $ 15.7 million, including around £ 1.3 million in the UK.

controversy

After the presentation of the Golden Lion in Venice in 2002, there were numerous protests and press reports; in addition, websites emerged on which the film was discussed extremely controversially. The Catholic Institute for Media Information and the Catholic Film Commission for Germany published a statement by the President of the international Catholic media organization SIGNIS , Fr. Peter Malone, in film-dienst 01/2003 , to contribute to the discussion about Mullan's film.

Some former inmates of the Magdalen homes complained that the film was unrealistic in that the actual conditions in the homes were considerably more brutal.

The Catholic Church and related publications in Italy sharply criticized the film before 2009. In an official statement, the Vatican recommended that all Catholics not watch the film.

In 2009, the discovery of the abuse scandals rocked by the Ryan report and the Murphy Report , the Roman Catholic Church in Ireland . The reports confirmed the film's allegations not only with regard to the Magdalene Homes, but also with regard to many other church-run institutions. Several bishops had to resign after even the Vatican expressed outrage over the events in Ireland.

See also

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Age rating for The Merciless Sisters . Youth Media Commission .
  2. ↑ James Berardinelli: Magdalene Sisters, The. A Film Review ; on: reelviews.net, 2003; last accessed on March 3, 2012.
  3. ↑ The Merciless Sisters in the Lexicon of International FilmsTemplate: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used , last accessed on March 3, 2012.
  4. ↑ The Internet Movie Database (IMDb.de): Filming locations for The Merciless Sisters (2002) ; Retrieved June 25, 2007.
  5. ↑ The Internet Movie Database (IMDb.de): Start dates for The merciless sisters (2002) ; Retrieved June 25, 2007.
  6. ↑ The Internet Movie Database (IMDb.de): Budget and box office results: The merciless sisters (2002) ; Retrieved March 3, 2012.
  7. ^ Fiachra Gibbons: In God's Name ; in: The Guardian, February 7, 2003 issue; last accessed on March 3, 2012.
  8. ^ Paul Badde: Everything stolen, everything missed, everything invented ; in: Die Welt, edition of January 8, 2003; last accessed on March 3, 2012.
  9. ↑ The Critique of the Vatican ; Article in: Hamburger Abendblatt, January 9, 2003 edition; last accessed on March 3, 2012.
  10. ↑ Clerical Sexual Abuse - Irish Bishops Submit Resignation ( Memento December 27, 2009 on Internet Archive ). In: tagesschau.de , December 25, 2009.
  11. ↑ Abuse scandal: Irish bishops offer resignation on Christmas Eve ; Article on Spiegel-Online from December 25, 2009.
  12. ↑ Carsten Volkery: Bishop withdrawal after abuse scandal: Ireland Catholic from craps ; Article on Spiegel-Online from December 17, 2009.