The film was released by Columbia Pictures on March 26, 1997. It received mixed reviews from critics, but was a financial success. This was the final film of director Pakula, who died the year after its release, and the final film photographed by Gordon Willis, who retired soon after.
Plot
In 1972 Northern Ireland, eight-year-old Frankie McGuire witnesses his father gunned down for republican sympathies.
Twenty years later in Belfast, Frankie and three fellow IRA members are ambushed by the British Army and Special Reconnaissance Unit agents. Two of the IRA gunmen are killed, but Frankie and his comrade Sean Phelan escape after managing to kill three soldiers, a civilian and four rival loyalists. Pursued by a British Army helicopter, Frankie's commander Martin MacDuff decides that the IRA needs Stinger missiles to fight back.
Under the alias "Rory Devaney", Frankie arrives in New York City to buy missiles. American Judge Peter Fitzsimmons, a longtime IRA supporter, arranges for him to stay with Irish-American NYPD Sergeant Tom O'Meara, his wife Sheila, and their three daughters on Staten Island. Believing that "Rory" is an immigrant construction worker, Tom and his family welcome Frankie into their home.
Sean reunites with Frankie, acquiring an old fishing boat to smuggle the missiles home. Frankie cuts a deal with black market arms dealer and Irish mobster Billy Burke to receive the missiles in several weeks time. Fitzsimmons has the money for the deal delivered to Frankie by Megan Doherty, another IRA operative posing as his family's nanny, and Frankie hides the duffel bag of cash in the O'Meara's basement. Megan later warns Frankie that MacDuff has been killed by British authorities and they must postpone the deal, much to Burke's displeasure.
After lying to protect his partner, Eddie Diaz, for fatally shooting an unarmed thief in the back, a guilt-stricken Tom decides to retire from the force. He comes clean to Sheila and they return home, only to be confronted by masked intruders. Frankie arrives and he and Tom fight off the intruders as Sheila calls the police, but they are held at gunpoint until sirens approach and the assailants flee. Frankie confronts Burke for sending his men to steal the money, shooting one of the attackers in the knee, but Burke reveals that he is holding Sean hostage and demands payment for the missiles.
Realizing that the intruders were searching Frankie's room in the basement, Tom discovers the duffel bag of cash. Confronted by Tom, Frankie reveals his true identity, but Tom has called Eddie and they arrest him. Stuck in traffic en route to the police station, Frankie overpowers Tom and takes his gun, mortally wounding Eddie when he draws his own gun, but is forced to flee without the money.
With Eddie dead, Tom is questioned by the FBI and their British counterparts and realizes that they intend to kill Frankie, who meets Burke at an abandoned warehouse. Demanding the money, Burke presents Frankie with the missiles as well as Sean's severed head, and Frankie hands over a duffel bag rigged with a bomb. The resulting explosion allows Frankie to kill Burke and his men, and he drives off with the missiles.
Frankie goes to Megan at the Fitzsimmons' residence, determined to complete his mission and deliver the missiles to Ireland. Downstairs, Tom interrupts a cocktail party and confronts the judge, before recognizing Megan from a photo in Frankie's bag, but Frankie escapes. Tom convinces Megan that only he can save Frankie from being killed by the authorities, and she directs him to the boat.
At the dock, Tom sneaks aboard as Frankie sets sail with the missiles, leading to a shootout. Tom is wounded and disarmed, and Frankie prepares to kill him but realizes he too has been shot. Tom embraces a dying Frankie, recognizing that they both were fighting for causes they believe in, before steering the boat back to shore.
The film's origins date back to the early 1980s,[6] it began as a pitch by producers Lawrence Gordon and Robert F. Colesberry, the producers hired screenwriter Kevin Jarre to write the first draft, as Gordon recalled "Jarre had disappeared for a couple of years and came back with a wonderful screenplay",[7][8] which was an action-packed tale about a heroic operative of the Irish Republican Army.[6] Gordon acquired the script in January 1990.[9]
In 1991, Gordon took the script to Brad Pitt, who was not yet well-known at the time, Pitt enthusiastically accepted the script,[2][6] which Gordon recalled "was supposed to be a gritty, low-budget thriller with Brad as the only star", the project began moving forward towards pre-production at Universal Pictures,[10] but was left at a standstill due to Pitt's none too impressive acting credits at the time, as well as the politically controversial subject matter on which the story was based.[7]
In the ensuing years interest in the project was renewed thanks to Pitt's performances in Legends of the Fall, Interview with the Vampire, and 12 Monkeys, the project was stuck in development at Universal before the studio put it into turnaround, eventually the project ended up at Columbia Pictures.[10] Pitt visited Belfast in preparation for the role and suffered bruises after he was attacked on the city's Falls Road after being mistaken for a Protestant.[11][2][7]
Casting
Despite having Pitt's name attached, the studio was of the opinion that he could not carry a major film alone. For the role of Tom O'Meara, both Gene Hackman and Sean Connery had been considered at various points, but at Pitt's suggestion, Harrison Ford was approached for the role,[6] which at that time was more of a character role. Ford read the script and agreed to play the part,[12][13] though that meant the script had to be rewritten to create a fuller role for Ford and a more complicated relationship between the characters played by the two men.[2]
To expand Ford's role, producers brought in David Aaron Cohen and Vincent Patrick to rewrite Jarre's script,[2][6] as Patrick stated "There was no way they were going to shoot the original script. It had to become a two-hero piece with equal action heroes. Supporting two stars is what this was about". Cohen added "Take it from Columbia's perspective, Twenty million, and you want Harrison to be the supporting actor?"[14]
For directing duties, James Gray was offered to direct the project but he turned it down,[15] as did Bryan Singer,[16] and Milcho Manchevski.[17] It was Pitt and Ford's suggestion to bring Alan J. Pakula in as director.,[2] Pakula initially turned it down, as he wanted to focus on other projects that he was developing at the time, he rejected the offer two more times, but eventually accepted the job after Columbia offered to pay him a fee of 5 million dollars.[6]
Filming
Principal photography started in February 1996, with the script "still in flux"; according to The New York Times, "ego clashes, budget overruns and long delays plagued the project."[14][18][1][2][19] Pitt "threatened to quit early in the shoot, complaining that the script was incomplete and incoherent" and later "denounced the movie as 'the most irresponsible bit of film making – if you can even call it that – that I've ever seen.'"[14][20][21]
To ease Pitt's frustrations, the producers hired screenwriter Terry George one week before principal photography was to start, George's primary purpose was to concentrate on helping further develop Pitt's character, and what the actor thought was a superficial outlook on the IRA situation.[2][7][19][22][23]
In March 1996, Pakula hired screenwriter Robert Mark Kamen to provide rewrites during production,[19][6] Kamen noted the difficulties on set as he recalled "They were running out of script to shoot. They had a script that wasn't acceptable to either actor, Alan [Pakula] didn't start with a script that everyone had signed off on, we were flying blind....It was scary".
Kamen met with both Ford and Pitt separately to discuss their ideas about improving the script, then he and Pakula would review the material, Pakula would add his own critical comments, and Kamen would go off to write the new scenes.[6]
Contrary to the rumors that were reported at the time, Kamen insisted that both actors were agreeable to each other, "It wasn't the tension between them that made things tense. It was the tension each had with their own parts."[2]
In June 2023, Ford admitted that he was partially at fault for the tension between him and Pitt stating: "I understand why he wanted to stay with his point of view, and I wanted to stay with my point of view, or I was imposing my point of view, and it's fair to say that that's what Brad felt, it was complicated".[24][25]
According to Pakula, one problem was that the film's plot did not fall along conventionally simple Hollywood lines, as Ford and Pitt were both playing "good guys" according to each of their own distinct moral codes. The New York Times characterized Ford's character as "the upright American cop who deplores violence" and Pitt's as "an I.R.A. gunman for whom violence is a reasonable solution to his people's 300 years of troubles."[14] Pakula compared his intent with the two characters to that depicted in Red River, a 1948 western in which John Wayne's character is defied by his young protégé, played by Montgomery Clift.[14]
Two months before it opened, the film was still unfinished: Pakula, unhappy with the final scene ("a showdown on a boat with a cargo of Stinger missiles"), called the actors and crew back for additional filming.[6] The scene was "rewritten and reshot over two days in a studio in California."[14]
Reception
The Devil's Own received mixed reviews from critics. On review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes, it has a 37% approval rating based on 41 reviews, with an average score of 5.2/10.[27] On Metacritic, it has a score of 53 out of 100, based on reviews from 26 critics, indicating “mixed or average reviews.”[28] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B−" on an A+ to F scale.[29]
Roger Ebert gave the film 2½ stars out of 4, saying it showed "ignorance of the history of Northern Ireland" and that "the issues involved between the two sides are never mentioned." The review criticised the contrived plot, stating "The moral reasoning in the film is so confusing that only by completely sidestepping it can the plot work at all." Pitt and Ford were praised, with Ebert complimenting the pair, describing them as "enormously appealing and gifted actors, and to the degree that the movie works, it's because of them."[30]
For much of its running length, The Devil's Own works as a passable thriller. Certain plot elements (including many of the details surrounding the missile deal) border on preposterous, but that often goes with the territory in films of this genre. The best parts of The Devil's Own are the quiet moments, such as when Frankie and Tom are talking, or when Tom is spending time with his family. There's also an effective subplot that forces Tom to examine his moral outlook on life when his partner (Ruben Blades) accidentally shoots a fleeing suspect in the back. Unfortunately, The Devil's Own goes downhill fast in the final half-hour. Suddenly, it's as if every significant character in the film has undergone a frontal lobotomy. Otherwise-intelligent men start doing extremely stupid things, and the entire "dumbing-down" process becomes frustrating to observe. The final scenes are solid, but the stuff that leads up to them is a problem.[31]
Janet Maslin called it an "unexpectedly solid thriller" with a "first-rate, madly photogenic performance" by Pitt; she notes that it is "directed by Alan J. Pakula in a thoughtful urban style that recalls the vintage New York stories of Sidney Lumet" and "handsomely photographed by Gordon Willis".[32]Richard Schickel called it "quite a good movie – a character-driven (as opposed to whammy-driven) suspense drama – dark, fatalistic and, within its melodramatically stretched terms, emotionally plausible"; he said Pakula "develops his story patiently, without letting its tensions unravel."[33]Entertainment Weekly gave it a "B+," calling it a "quiet, absorbing, shades-of-gray drama, a kind of thriller meditation on the schism in Northern Ireland."[34]
A reviewer for Salon.com called it "a disjointed, sluggish picture" with a problematic script that "bears the marks of tinkering": "swatches of the story appear to be missing, relationships aren't clearly defined, and characters aren't identified."[35]
Variety said:
Whatever contortions the script went through on its way to the result, Pakula has managed to maintain an admirable concentration on the central moral equation, which posits the Irish terrorist's understandable political and emotional motivations for revenge versus the decent cop's sense of justice and the greater human good.[36]
The film grossed $140 million, exceeding its $90 million budget, of which $43 million was from North America.[citation needed]
Brad Pitt's Belfast brogue was criticized by several reviewers.[37] In 2024, the website Irish Central listed it as one of "The Worst Irish Accents in a Hollywood Movies".[38]
Cast and crew response
In retrospect, Brad Pitt said: "I really like Devil's Own. It was a good schooling for me. Still, I think the movie could have been better. Literally, the script got thrown out."[39]
Harrison Ford is also very fond of the movie: "We had a real hard time making it, but Alan [Pakula] made, I think, a really good movie out of it."[40]
British Royal family controversy
The film was involved in adverse publicity when, two months before her death, Diana, Princess of Wales took 15-year-old Prince William, and 12-year-old Prince Harry, to see the movie. The movie was restricted to movie-goers aged 15 or older, and the Princess persuaded the cinema to let Prince Harry stay despite him being three years underage. She was criticised for flouting the law, for using her influence to persuade the cinema's employees to flout the law, and because of the movie's subject matter (which was said to glamorise the IRA – highly sensitive given that her sons' great-uncle Earl Mountbatten was assassinated by the IRA). She later apologised, saying she had been unaware of the film's content.[41]
Novelization
A paperback novel of the film, written by Christopher Newman, was published by Dell Publishing, and released in 1997.[42][43]
^Roger Ebert (28 March 1997). "The Devil's Own". Chicago Sun-Times. Archived from the original on 11 October 2012. Retrieved 18 April 2011. In the opening scenes, an 8-year-old boy is having dinner with his family when masked men burst into their cottage and shoot his father dead. Flash forward 20 years, and now Francis McGuire (Brad Pitt) has been cornered in a Belfast hideout.
^Jeff Giles (16 September 2011). "Brad Pitt: The EW interview". Entertainment Weekly. Archived from the original on 30 May 2023. Retrieved 11 March 2019.
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