Jordan turns to Pat McCabe’s boundless imagination once more and recreates Ireland’s turbulent 1970s as an odyssey of gender-bending possibility, courtesy of irrepressible cross-dressing Patrick ‘Kitten’ Braden.

Cillian Murphy triumphs in the central role with a blend of determined flounce and bruised fragility, holding together a picaresque narrative which ultimately relinquishes momentum for in-the-moment revelation. What moments they are though, including Brendan Gleeson as a psychotic Womble, Liam Neeson’s sympathetically flawed cleric, and an IRA nerve centre as never seen before. And for all the fizzy stylisation, we never lose sight of the heartbreak and horror only just kept at bay.

Neil Jordan will be interviewed by his friend and frequent collaborator Pat McCabe in our FREE Afternoon Talk on May 25th (14.10).

Showing as part of our Neil Jordan Retrospective which runs throughout May. His new film, Byzantium, opens on May 31st.

See our online exhibition of some of Neil Jordan’s substantial document collections held by the IFI Irish Film Archive.