stephen c
Exceptionally strong documentary filmmaking
I, Dolours is a documentary about Dolours Price, a volunteer in the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA). Revealing controversial information for the first time, covering subject matter which remains divisive in both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland, the film covers her time in the Unknowns, a secret intelligence unit operating out of Belfast in the early 1970s, and her involvement with the first four of the Disappeared; sixteen people abducted, murdered, and buried by the IRA between 1972 and 1985.
Born in Belfast in 1951 into a deeply Republican family, Price joined People's Democracy in 1968, a political group advocating for civil rights for the Catholic minority in Northern Ireland. However, frustrated with their lack of progress, she became increasingly radicalised, and joined the Provisional IRA in 1971. Promoted to the Unknowns in 1972, she was later assigned to the team to carry out the Old Bailey bombing in 1973, which left over 200 people injured. Arrested whilst boarding a flight back to Northern Ireland, she was sentenced to life, later commuted to 20 years, and in 1981, having been on hunger strike for over 200 days, she received the Royal Prerogative of Mercy, and was released on humanitarian grounds. A vehement opponent of the Good Friday Agreement (1999), she believed that Sinn Fein had sold out to the British government, betraying the Irish people and the memory of dead Republicans. She died in her sleep in 2013, after mixing sedatives with anti-depressants.
Derived from a taped 2010 interview with Price, conducted by journalists Ed Moloney and (former IRA volunteer) Anthony McIntyre, I, Dolorous is written by Moloney and Maurice Sweeney, and directed by Sweeny. Its main significance is the information Price provides about four of the Disappeared; Joe Lynskey, Jean McConville, Kevin McKee, and Seamus Wright. According to Price, her task was to transport those marked for death across the border into the Republic of Ireland, where she would hand them over to Dundalk volunteers, after which they would be killed and buried. Price claims that in the case of McConville, however, she was actually involved in the murder. And it is here where the documentary is at its most controversial and its strongest.
For the most part, Price shows no remorse for her actions, especially in relation to McConville, whose murder remains one of the most controversial incidents of the Troubles. A widowed mother of ten, when the IRA first acknowledged the Disappeared in 1999, they stated that McConville had had a radio transmitter hidden in her flat, which she used to send information to the British Army. However, it was argued at the time that, as a widow trying to raise ten young children, she wouldn't have had access to sensitive information. According to Price, however, the IRA knew she was informing because of an entirely different reason. She claims that McConville was working on identifying suspects from Hastings Street police station in Belfast by way of standing behind a blanket with a small slit for her to look through. However, the blanket didn't come to the ground, and one of those brought in front of her claims he recognised her slippers.
Whilst the film is definitely at its best when dealing with the McConville murder, its handling of other aspects of Price's story are also laudable. For example, it does a fine job of tracing her ideological development, particularly as it relates to her family. In this sense, the film is very much about the seductive power of some of the more romantic myths of Irish Republicanism contrasted with the savage day-to-day reality of waging a guerrilla war. The film makes it easy to see the attraction of the sectarian moral code; the absolute and unrelenting desire to unite Ireland by any means necessary, clearly charting Price's radicalisation as she transitions from civil rights activist to convicted bomber to hunger striker to peace process critic.
Towards the end of I, Dolours, Price refers to the Good Friday agreement as "a failure of my life's purpose," and one of the last things she says is, "it's all been for nothing." This can come across as either the deeply tragic end to a life lived for her country, or the just deserts for a murderer, depending on your politics. And the fact that her story is so emotive, irrespective of which side of the debate upon which you fall, speaks very much to the quality of the work. Powerful and contentious documentary filmmaking of the highest calibre, I, Dolours should be required viewing in Irish schools, north and south of the border.
Rated 4/5 Stars •
Rated 4 out of 5 stars
03/30/23
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