2006 Movie Poll by BBC

"The Wind that Shakes the Barley" has taken second place on BBC One's "Film 2006 with Jonathan Ross." This is an interactive poll taken through the website of the BBC, so it's hardly a scientific poll, but it does show us that the Ken Loach-directed drama about the Irish War of Independence, starring Cillian Murphy, Padraig Delaney Liam Cunningham and Orla Fitzgerald, has not gone unnoticed in the United Kingdom. We saw the movie at a special journalists' preview; we can't understand why IFC, the distributor of the film in the United States, is waiting - hesitating? - until March to release this enthralling, riveting and award-winning film. Although it won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival last May(see http://thewildgeese.com/blogs/2006_05_01_archive.html), the movie will not be eligible for an Academy Award in 2007 because it has not been shown for a week in Los Angeles before the end of calendar year 2006. So any pre-Oscar buzz for Murphy, who was Golden Globe nominated last year for his performance in "Breakfast on Pluto," is moot.

Patricia Jameson-Sammartano,
Culture Editor, www.thewildgeese.com

Above, Cillian Murphy and Padraig Delaney as brothers Damien and Teddy, serving in the Irish Republican Army, in "The Wind That Shakes the Barley." Pathe.co.uk photo

http://www.rte.ie/arts/2006/1229/windthatshakesthebarley.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/films/2006/11/03/the_wind_that_shakes_the_barley_dvd_2006_review.shtml