Film 30/52: The Devil's Own (1997)

I'm not sure why it's taken me so long to get around to watching The Devil's Own. Harrison Ford rarely disappoints. But here we are, finally catching up on this one 25 years after its original release.

Pitt plays an IRA member who travels to New York to covertly close a deal on some Stinger missiles to bring back home to help fight the good fight. Ford plays Tom O'Meara — an Irish New York cop who, as a favor to a friend 'sponsoring' Pitt's Rory (aka Frankie), opens up his home to the young Irishman. Things go awry, and when Tom ultimately finds out about Rory's true identity, he decides he's the only one who can bring Frankie in alive.

The Devil's Own was the final film directed by Alan Pakula. He and Ford had worked together previously on Presumed Innocent (based on the Scott Turow novel); another good film — Ford's haircut notwithstanding. This one has a great supporting cast, including Rubén Blades as Tom's partner, Treat Williams in a surprisingly menacing performance as the man supplying the stinger missiles, the late, great Mitchell Ryan (the original Burke Devlin from Dark Shadows) as Tom's boss, Natascha McElhone (a year before he star turn as Deirdre in John Frankenheimer's Ronin) as a love interest for Frankie, and Julia Stiles as Tom's oldest daughter. 

I was pleasantly surprised that for all the twists I anticipated from the story, there were additional turns that veered off the path one might have predicted for a film like this. In a good way. As Frankie tells Tom — it's an Irish story, not an American story. It also has a good James Horner score, and a song by The Cranberries ("God Be With You") over the opening credits!

If you can put up with Pitt's Irish accent, it's worth checking out. Glad to have finally made the time for this one on the big screen!
 



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