Film Reviews

The Yellow Bittern

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• Details: Ireland/US / 120mins (15A).

A documentary on The Clancy Brothers and Tommy Makem mightn't be high on anyone but your dad's list, but Irish documentary maker Alan Gilsenan puts together an almost flawless film on the group's only surviving member, Liam Clancy. After Saviours, Waveriders and now this, there seems to be something happening with Irish documentaries lately: They're getting really good.
Director Gilsenan shoots Clancy, perched on a stool, guitar on his lap, in a large hall as he watches former glories on a large screen. Clancy is the perfect interviewee - honest, open and unafraid to get into the nitty gritty of his life, his women, his drink problems, and in-band fighting. Clancy himself narrates as he takes us from growing up in Tipperary and his move to Greenwich Village, New York in the '50s. It's here that he meets Diane Guggenheim, the daughter of Harry Guggenheim (not a fan of our Liam, it turned out), a collector of Irish folk music and who became infatuated with Clancy, financing his early years. The short-lived romance ended in disaster with the unstable Diane's attempted suicide. Around the same time, Liam, his brothers and Tommy Makem formed a band that takes the folk scene by storm, a scene that was growing in popularity in New York. They played for JFK, appearances on the Ed Sullivan Show and Carnegie Hall followed, but success always brought problems and the band slowly disintegrated.
But the documentary doesn't stop there - Clancy's solo career is dealt with in detail, as is his private life, and the eventual band reunion in 1984. We see Clancy's childhood dreams of being an actor (judging by the one clip on show he wasn't half bad) get sidelined when the group takes off. They reached such heights that Bob Dylan hails Clancy as 'the best ballad singer' he's heard. Thorough, informative and interesting, The Yellow Bittern might stop at turning the audience into a fan of Liam Clancy the musician, but you might just leave the cinema a fan of Liam Clancy the man.

Review by Gavin Burke