Film review: Mrs Robinson is a fine testament to the woman who remains the figurehead of modern Ireland

The film charts Mary Robinson’s relentlessly upward trajectory where she proved herself a champion of Irish women’s rights

Mrs Robinson is absorbing, enlightening and frequently moving

• Mrs Robinson 
• ★★★★★ 
• Cinematic release

Directed by Aoife Kelleher, Mrs Robinson (12A) is a documentary about the life (to date) of Mary Robinson, formerly the president of Ireland and a UN high commissioner for human rights, and currently ‘a powerful Irish woman striding the international stage’ as she campaigns for climate justice.

Opening on her childhood years in Co Mayo, when she experienced ‘an inner sense of justice from an early age’ and ‘the unfairness of being a girl, a woman’ in Irish society, the film charts Robinson’s relentlessly upward trajectory through Trinity College, Harvard and the Irish law courts, where she proved herself a champion of Irish women’s rights as well as defending and promoting the rights of those marginalised by law and society.

A full list of her achievements would take up the entire page, and Kelleher’s film certainly does them full justice; what is equally fascinating are the behind-the-scenes glimpses we get of a Mary Robinson who is funny and mischievous, and which run contrary to her public persona of an austere and patrician figure.

Absorbing, enlightening and frequently moving, Mrs Robinson is a fine testament to the woman who remains the figurehead of modern Ireland.