Film Review: That They May Face The Rising Sun is delicate but unsentimental

Barry Ward and Anna Bederke in That They May Face The Rising Sun

• That They May Face the Rising Sun 
• ★★★★☆
• Cinema release

Adapted from John McGahern’s final novel, That They May Face the Rising Sun (PG) revolves around Joe (Barry Ward) and Kate Ruttledge (Anna Bederke), a married couple who ‘came in against the tide’ by moving to rural Leitrim from London during the 1980s.

An author and an artist respectively, Joe and Kate revel in the peaceful quiet of their bolthole at the end of a long country lane, although they’re rarely alone for very long: neighbours, including Mary (Ruth McCabe), Jamesie (Philip Dolan), and Patrick (Lalor Roddy), can generally be relied upon to drop by for a chat.

Barry Ward in That They May Face The Rising Sun

There isn’t a great deal happening in the book Joe is currently working on, and nor is there much drama in Pat Collins’ film, which is faithful to McGahern’s novel by offering an unsentimental account of rural life and the interlinked lives of the locals, who are sharp of eye and tongue, and insatiably curious about one another’s business.

The landscape is quintessentially Irish with its reed-choked fields and drystone walls, but religion is every bit important a backdrop here as Catholic Ireland begins to slough off the authoritarian Church and move towards a more personal spirituality personified by Joe and Kate and their quasi-Zen approach of ‘just living day to day’.

Beautifully shot, with a delicate touch courtesy of cinematographer Richard Kendrick, That They May Face the Rising Sun features fine performances throughout, with Lalor Roddy offering a career-best turn as the verbally vicious but quietly profound rural bachelor.