No doubt inspirational, "My Left Foot" is an unflinching look at the life of Christy Brown, born with cerebral palsy and who, with great determination, taught himself to paint with his only usable limb. The character of Christy is portrayed by two remarkable actors, Hugh O'Connor as the young boy, and Daniel Day-Lewis as the adult Christy. The film is not shy about revealing all of the frustration and anger that motivates the man, and in some respects, one will stand in shock at his behavior when things in life do not go his way. His behavior at the dinner party when his language teacher, Dr. Eileen Cole (Fiona Shaw) announced her engagement to Peter (Adrian Dunbar) was one example. His utter rage at an insult against the family, resulting in a barroom brawl was another, so the person was not entirely sympathetic.
There were aspects of the picture that didn't ring true to me, and not having read Christy Brown's autobiography, I have no way of knowing if my observations have merit. But for one, there is not one single example of anyone bullying or making fun of the young Christy as a boy. This seemed rather unbelievable to me, as knowing how cruel kids can be, even when not meaning to, that there were no examples of that kind of behavior. Nor was there any reference to how the parents (Ray McAnally, Brenda Fricker) dealt with their son's bodily functions. This may sound gross or unsympathetic, but someone in the family had to attend to those necessities and it wasn't addressed in any sort of way. The behavior and attitude of Christy's many siblings was also a model of decorum throughout, and one marvels at the idea that there were never any squabbles among them growing up.
As with many of these biopics, I'm always leery about the Hollywood treatment of making a film with the greatest universal appeal, so that also led me to doing a quick search on the real Christy Brown. I was startled to learn that his relationship with Mary Carr (Ruth McCabe) began while he was having an affair with a married American woman who he intended to wed upon her divorce. The marriage to Mary was fraught with it's own set of problems, as she was accused of being an abusive alcoholic and habitually unfaithful. So the movie's feel good ending was not entirely accurate in the way it was portrayed.
Be that as it may, Daniel Day-Lewis is astounding as the adult Christy Brown, having earned a Best Actor Oscar for his efforts. I would almost call it the best performance ever by an actor of a disabled person, but have to qualify that now after having seen Eddie Redmayne's portrayal of Stephen Hawking in 2014's "The Theory of Everything". I'm still puzzled though over Brown's cryptic written words after coming to terms with Eileen Cole's engagement - "All is nothing. Therefore nothing must end." In trying to parse the phrase, anything I come up with doesn't make sense.
There were aspects of the picture that didn't ring true to me, and not having read Christy Brown's autobiography, I have no way of knowing if my observations have merit. But for one, there is not one single example of anyone bullying or making fun of the young Christy as a boy. This seemed rather unbelievable to me, as knowing how cruel kids can be, even when not meaning to, that there were no examples of that kind of behavior. Nor was there any reference to how the parents (Ray McAnally, Brenda Fricker) dealt with their son's bodily functions. This may sound gross or unsympathetic, but someone in the family had to attend to those necessities and it wasn't addressed in any sort of way. The behavior and attitude of Christy's many siblings was also a model of decorum throughout, and one marvels at the idea that there were never any squabbles among them growing up.
As with many of these biopics, I'm always leery about the Hollywood treatment of making a film with the greatest universal appeal, so that also led me to doing a quick search on the real Christy Brown. I was startled to learn that his relationship with Mary Carr (Ruth McCabe) began while he was having an affair with a married American woman who he intended to wed upon her divorce. The marriage to Mary was fraught with it's own set of problems, as she was accused of being an abusive alcoholic and habitually unfaithful. So the movie's feel good ending was not entirely accurate in the way it was portrayed.
Be that as it may, Daniel Day-Lewis is astounding as the adult Christy Brown, having earned a Best Actor Oscar for his efforts. I would almost call it the best performance ever by an actor of a disabled person, but have to qualify that now after having seen Eddie Redmayne's portrayal of Stephen Hawking in 2014's "The Theory of Everything". I'm still puzzled though over Brown's cryptic written words after coming to terms with Eileen Cole's engagement - "All is nothing. Therefore nothing must end." In trying to parse the phrase, anything I come up with doesn't make sense.