Cinema
Orphans
Peter Mullan · 1998
Synopsis
Glasgow, a Sunday evening. Thomas, Michael, John and Sheila keep vigil over their mother's body in a church, on the eve of the funeral. Thomas, the eldest, decides to spend the entire night beside the coffin and demands that the others stay. Michael is stabbed in a pub and refuses to go to hospital so as not to miss the ceremony. John looks for the man who did it. Sheila, in a wheelchair, goes out alone into the city. The storm tears the roof off the church.
Context
The film was shot in Glasgow with local theatre actors and a very small budget, by a man who was then acting for others and directing for the first time. It mixes mourning and farce without warning, to music by Craig Armstrong. Presented at Venice in September 1998, it was released in the United Kingdom only eight months later. A musical-comedy adaptation, staged by the National Theatre of Scotland, was premiered in Glasgow in 2022.
Who it is for
One hour forty in Glaswegian English, subtitled. The shift from grief to comedy is abrupt and intentional; it has to be accepted from the very first scene.
Prizes and reception
Two awards at Venice in 1998, the grand prize of the Paris film festival the following year, and the prize for best newcomer awarded to its author in 2000.