| | |  | DENMARK | Home » » Song for a Raggy Boy | | | | | | | Description: | | A teacher takes on the corrupt leadership of an Irish reform school in this drama based on a true story. William Franklin (Aidan Quinn) is a teacher who was born in Ireland and moved to the United States only to repatriate in 1939 after his leftist political views cause him to lose his job. Franklin becomes the first non-cleric instructor at St. Jude's, a school for wayward boys run by Brother John Iain Glen, who is a firm believer in strong discipline. Adapted from the memoir by Patrick Galvin, who also helped adapt his story for the screen. | | | Product Details: | | | Actors:
| Alan Devlin, Iain Glen, Aidan Quinn, Dudley Sutton, John Travers | | Director:
| Aisling Walsh | | Format:
| Dolby, Import, NTSC | | Language:
| English | | Number of Discs:
| 1 | | Studio:
| Tva Films | | Run Time:
| 93 minutes | | DVD Release Date:
| May 08, 2007 | | Average Customer Rating:
|  based on 14 reviews |
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- Mint | | | $64.30+ $4.49 *Shipping | Used
- Good | |
| New | |
| $19.74+ $3.99 *Shipping | New | | | $19.99+ $4.49 *Shipping | New | |
| Used | |
| $7.88+ $4.49 *Shipping | Used
- Mint | | | $12.00+ $4.49 *Shipping | Used
- VeryGood | | | $19.25+ $4.49 *Shipping | Used
- Mint | | | $28.31+ $3.99 *Shipping | Used
- Good | | | $50.78+ $4.49 *Shipping | Used
- Mint | | | $64.30+ $4.49 *Shipping | Used
- Good | |
| | | | Customer Reviews: | |
Average Customer Review:
 ( 14 customer reviews )
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
6 of 6 found the following review helpful:
 Suspicious..May 03, 2010
By Margaret Fuller
I saw this movie at Sundance and then it disappeared. I've always suspected the Catholic Church bought it or in some way had something to do with the distribution. What an incredible film -- best acting Aidan Quinn has ever done.
6 of 6 found the following review helpful:
Wonderful and GrippingSep 28, 2006
By Ed Mortensen
"Sci-Fi Guy"
First, read the very good review already submitted.
Second, please take it from me that this is a wonderfully emotional and solid movie about the hopeless conditions inside the Irish orphanage/correctional system up until these institutions were shut down in 1984. (1984!)
The atrocities are depicted well and the inspiration that this movie shows us lets us have hope for some of these prisons for unwanted children.
With solid performances from both child and adult actors we can truly see though the eyes of each as we are taken through a tale of hopelessness, horror, daring to trust and finally love.
But, I must warn you that this is not a Hollywood "feel good" movie. You will be left with anger and only some feelings of vindication when this movie is over. You will find no villains that you "love to hate" here.
8 of 9 found the following review helpful:
Reflexive, penetrating, haunting and mesmerizing movie!Aug 16, 2005
By Hiram Gomez Pardo
Aidan Quinn was magisterial in this poignant story about a children correctional in Ireland 1938. He comes to this singular place ruled namely by a weak director who knows obey and respect the holy world of the Bishop who named to Father John, a true disturbed mind and emotionally castrated: He in the name of preserving the discipline above any other considerations infringes cruel and abusive punishments to this young community, integrated basically by orphans, rebels without cause and twisted behaviors. A real micro cosmos human. Quinn will have to face against this challenge, and searching for the consequences of this terrible conduct he finds the answer; they are hunger for love, consideration and warmth human. He gets from them the best they can, his classes are sealed with the imagination seed and the enthusiasm: there will be serious encounters with Father John and his stupid rules about territory delimitation, censoring in the name of his dogmatic precepts what's right and what's wrong.
But this rotten and hypocrite attitude will reach a dramatic climax. The teacher award them in the Christmas Night and become an unconditional allied when the abuses be perpetrated against their fragile humanity.
Based in real facts, the film also describes through sharp flashbacks the background of this teacher who lost his wife in the Spanish Civil War; he knows about sorrows, but despite about it he owns a noble heart and simply doesn't accept any injustice.
Impressive acting of Iaian Glenn in the role of the satanic and distorted mind Father John. Striking film that will leave you thinking a long time.
This film won the Sundance Film Festival in the category of Women in Cinema Lena Sharpe Award for Persistence in Vision 2003!
"Those who just live thinking about how to make the welfare, have not time to be good human beings."
Rabindranatah Tagore.
Literature Prize Nobel 1915.
2 of 2 found the following review helpful:
History in MakingJun 07, 2010
By Michael Kerjman
In 1939 William Franklin, an anti-Franco veteran of the bloody Spanish Civil War, arrives as first-ever lay teacher in a strict Catholic Reformatory and Industrial School for wayward boys. He soon learns the academic challenge is formidable, many boys being still illiterate, but gradually earns their trust, respect, in time almost devotion, with 'paternal' kindness, making the layman the opposite of the cruel prefect, brother John, who frequently administers painful and humiliating punishments, even the gentle, old superior Father Damian has no authority against his disciplinary mandate from the grim bishop Conlon while Father Mac simply uses opportunity to satisfy his sexual urges.
A movie climaxes into something positively-right also a lasting reality of sexual abuse in hands of clergy still presents the most vivid opposites up to date.
2 of 2 found the following review helpful:
The perversity of fanaticism.Jul 27, 2008
By Stephen Thoemmes
"All sins are just efforts to fill voids."
Another excellent reason to purchase a multi-region DVD player.
This film was very difficult for me to watch. Being a victim of long time abuse, such as in this film, it really rang true. It always takes a courageous individual to stand up for what is right and moral. Through the silence of our submissiveness and self-doubt allows such abuse to continue. It took an outsider, lay teacher, to bring these Catholic brothers to task for monstrous behavior. It is so self-evident that unquestioned power poisons the soul no matter to whom it belongs.
Excellent film, a learning moment, and a reminder that such horrors exist all over the world in many faiths. It is sad that so many belief systems start out so idealistically and morph, through human weakness and stupidity, into soul destroying dogmatic powerhouses.
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