'King of the Travellers' – Movie review

King of the Travellers

Runtime 80 minutes

15A

Review by Cathy Power

King of the Travellers is directed by Mark O’Connor, stars Peter Coonan (Love/Hate), Michael Collins (Man About Dog), newcomer John Connors, and non-actors from the Travelling community, with singer/songwriter Damien Dempsey providing the music.

THIS IS NOT a film about the Travelling community – it is a film about violence which just happens to be set amongst the Travelling community.

That was the answer when a panel of cast and directors were asked at the film’s preview why settled people’s prejudices against Travellers were not dealt with on screen.

The opening scene is brilliant with a sulky race taking place on a motorway: three vehicles following close behind to keep the other motorists back and a hell for leather contest taking place.

The aftermath of that race sets up the plot: a boy’s memory of his father’s murder and his obsession with revenge.

The rest of the film is very hit and miss and there is a weakness in the scripting that does no justice to the characters, particularly the women.

The young man, John Paul of the Moorehouse family (played by newcomer John Connors), is a bare-knuckle fighter and is fairly handy at it too. He battles mainly against the Power family. The Powers live across a field owned by a stereotypical rich man, who has stereotypical racist thugs working for him and who wants to get rid of the halting sites on the borders of his land.

The cast mainly comprises Travellers, with the exception of  Peter Coonan (okay, Fran from Love/Hate, pictured right), who plays crazy ‘Mickey the Bags’.

As a settled person, I was surprised at the inclusion of what I would have thought of as clichéd portrayals of that community in a film involving so many Travellers. No one else there seemed to care and in fact many expressed pride in the production.

There were miserable halting sites, everyone was going around on horses (not a jeep in sight and only one van), and when there was a party, they all drank poitín. Who knew?

On the other hand, John Paul works on his pre-fight psychology by watching videos, made to taunt him by his rivals, on his laptop and the lads gobble magic mushrooms like they were born to it.

The plot is Shakespearian in its twists and turns and Hamlet and Romeo and Juliet-like allusions turn up before a terrible ending littered with corpses and grief.

Not exactly a barrel of laughs or uplifting to the spirit but an interesting insight into how Travellers see themselves and how we all bring our prejudices with us to the cinema.