Puckoon

Just finished watching this, the new dvd release of Spike Milligan's Puckoon. Adapted and directed by Terence Ryan, it stays relatively faithful to the novel, with the cast acquiting themselves well to the script: it won't win awards, nor will the cast for acting powress, but it's a very warm-hearted film, which is a little confusing in structure, and suffers from some atrocious continuity.

It is, though, probably the best Irish film since John Ford's The Quiet Man starring John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara.

Both feature an almost mythical Ireland - whimsical, hard-drinking, slightly dim-witted people - but it's an Ireland which even the Irish like... well, those who insist on not killing each other.

They are the real Irish.

And the IRA can kiss my arse, for I'm mostly Welsh but I'm proud of my few pints of Irish blood.