ITALY: BRITISH ACTOR TURNED DIRECTOR PETER MULLEN TAKES THE VENICE FILM FESTIVAL BY STORM WITH HIS CONTROVERSIAL FILM 'THE MAGDALENE SISTERS'

Record ID: 393073

  • Title: ITALY: BRITISH ACTOR TURNED DIRECTOR PETER MULLEN TAKES THE VENICE FILM FESTIVAL BY STORM WITH HIS CONTROVERSIAL FILM 'THE MAGDALENE SISTERS'
  • Date: 30th August 2002
  • Summary: LIDO, VENICE (AUGUST 30, 2002) (REUTERS) VARIOUS GVS VENICE AT SUNSET (3 SHOTS)
  • Embargoed: 14th September 2002 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: LIDO, VENICE, ITALY
  • Country: Italy
  • Topics: General
  • Reuters ID: LVA1RXSGXTKRSDNM49O9PB49ZJ23
  • Story Text: British actor turned director Peter Mullen has taken the Venice Film Festival by storm with his controversial film, The Magdalene Sisters, based on the true story of the young Irish Catholic women, rape victims, unmarried mothers or "temptresses" who were institutionalised by the Catholic church to atone for their sins.
    Scottish director Peter Mullan doesn't mince words when it comes to the Roman Catholic Church or his new film "The Magdalene Sisters", an unflinching look at cruelty at one of Ireland's "benevolent" religious institutions.
    The movie tells the true story of four poor girls interned in the Magdalene Asylums who fight to escape the daily brutality and humiliation showered on them by the Sisters of Mercy.
    Girls from poor backgrounds and considered "promiscuous"
    were sent to the institutions and forced to work in laundries as virtual slaves until the last institution was closed in the mid-1990s. Their "crimes" could range from being an unmarried mother, to being the victim of rape, or even just being pretty.
    After a very well-received debut at the 59th Venice Film Festival that made "The Magdalene Sisters" a strong candidate for the Golden Lion award, Mullan said he was inspired by a documentary about the hidden suffering of the Magdalene girls and women. And his own experiences of working in so-called charitable organisations run by the church particularly influenced his protrayal of the nuns.
    "I worked with a nun when I was 17 in Poplar in London for homeless women and the day I arrived we said prayers, and again it was before I went to university, between school and university and she said let's say prayers and hey I was 17, a bit old for that but fine. So we start saying prayers and right behind her, right behind her was a huge great portrait of Benito Mussolini, 1978 London - I mean what's the nazi, what's the fascist doing on this wall? And she was the cruellest women I ever met, never saw cruelty like it ever. "
    Mullan, who is best known for his award-winning performance as a recovering alcoholic in Ken Loach's "My Name is Joe", also underlined the church's present scandals involving clerics abusing youngsters.
    "Over the last 170 years, I can't think of a time when the Catholic Church had a lower esteem than what it has now. ...
    What began as the odd scandal in the 1980s is now pandemic,"
    Mullan said.
    "The Catholic Church knows it's going to have to face up to all of the things it has done," said the Glaswegian, who hit the red carpet wearing a kilt and gold jacket for the film's premier at the 59th Venice Film Festival.
    With its scenes of rape and torture, Mullan expects trouble for his film in Catholic countries.
    The movie is one of 21 features vying for the coveted Golden Lion in Venice's main competition four years after his directorial debut "Orphans", about a working-class Glasgow family, won four prizes in Venice's sidebar International Critics Week competition.
    Mullan, the third-youngest of eight children, was born in Peterhead and grew up in what he has called a "dirt-poor family."
    With a long career in theatre and film behind him and nearing 40, Mullan suddenly found he was an overnight sensation with "My Name is Joe".
    Now the Scottish hero is appearing with actresses Nastassja Kinski and Milla Jovovich in Michael Winterbottom's "The Claim" -- and he's gearing up for the starring role in a new film of "Macbeth" opposite the goddess of grunge, Courtney Love.
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