Maggie Smith and Kathy Bates play longtime friends in ’60s Ballygar, Ireland hoping to win a church talent contest for a pilgrimage to Lourdes, France, in Irish director Thaddeus O’Sullivan’s dramedy THE MIRACLE CLUB. Actually there are three friends, with the third being a young neighbor, played by Agnes O’Casey. The women have differing reason for wanting to make the pilgrimage – two hope for a miracle and one wants a trip of lifetime. There is a fourth woman is on the trip, Chrissie (Laura Linney), the long-absent daughter of a recently deceased friend, who has returned after four decades in America for the funeral of her estranged mother.
THE MIRACLE CLUB is a well-meaning drama with dashes of comedy, but it is less about religion than you might assume for a movie about a trip to the religious site of Lourdes. Rather, it is more about self-reflection on long-held grudges, guilt and regrets, and the possibility of forgiveness and hope. While the film is warm, it is also predictable, although it is lifted by its remarkable cast, which includes Laura Linney and Stephen Rea. The Irish dramedy is based on a story by Jimmy Smallhorne, with a screenplay by Smallhorne, Timothy Prager and Joshua D. Maurer.
Eileen (Kathy Bates) is one of the two hoping for a miracle. She has discovered a lump in her breast and although she hasn’t been to a doctor, she is sure it is cancer, so she is hoping for a miracle cure from Lourdes famous waters. She is also looking for a break from her stressful home life, with a chaotic house full of children and a lazy husband, Frank (Stephen Rea), who does nothing to help out. Young wife and mother Dolly (Agnes O’Casey) is hoping for a miracle for her school age son, Daniel (Eric D. Smith), who has never spoken a word, and is determined to go to Lourdes despite opposition from her domineering husband George (Mark McKenna), who leaves all the care of the house, Daniel and their newborn baby entirely to his wife while treating her with dismissive disrespect. Lily (Maggie Smith), who has a bad leg, isn’t looking for a cure or a miracle, but she dreams of visiting a site she always wanted to see, while she’s still able to travel. Lily is haunted by the death of her only son Declan, who drown in the sea forty years ago, and she frequently visits his seaside memorial plaque, an obsession her needy husband (Niall Buggy) doesn’t understand.
The women live in a neighborhood that is a close-knit community, more like a village than part of a big city. But life is hard, particularly for women in this traditional, patriarchal era, and the women are full of regrets, resentments, disappointments and grudges. The lure of the trip is less religious devotion than the idea of travel to “exotic” France, to a famous place where miracles might happen. Pilgrimage site Lourdes is a perfect spot for this dream, a place where the faithful believe the waters have the power to heal but also somewhere with a reputation as a kind of Catholic “Disneyland,” filled with touristy souvenir shops.
The church talent show is run by the kindly priest Father Dermot Byrne (Mark O’Halloran) in the church hall. But Father Byrne is also overseeing a funeral, for a longtime friend of Lily and Eileen whose daughter left Ireland for American forty years ago under a cloud of scandal. The long-absent daughter, Chrissie (Laura Linney) has now returned for the funeral, although she did not arrive in time to say goodbye to her estranged mother.
When Chrissie turns up at the church hall where the talent contest is taking place, the reception she gets from long-ago friends Eileen and Lily is more than chilly – hostile even, with sharp-tongued Eileen especially vicious in her snub.
Yet all four women end up on the bus for the trip to Lourdes, along with the parish priest, who acts as tour director, and hopes for some kind of healing, emotional and spiritual, for the women. Despite Chrissie’s unwelcome presence, Lily, Eileen and Dolly are excited about the trip, which includes a night in a hotel, likely the first time these work-class women have had that experience.
The movie gets off to a slow start and has some stiff, awkward moments, particularly when the characters first get to Lourdes, but about halfway through it takes a turns towards a deeper, human story. The film is plagued by predictability but it is lifted by its great cast, who deliver some sparkling moments despite it all.
This is very much an ensemble film but Agnes O’Casey, the great-granddaughter of legendary Irish playwright Sean O’Casey, is particularly impressive in her first feature film role. Maggie Smith is, as always, amazing but her Lily is a far different, more reserved character, than the Dowager Countess played in “Downton Abbey,” so fans expecting those verbal zingers will be largely disappointed. It is Kathy Bates’ Eileen who is the fiery one in this story, and Eileen peppers the air with some salty language, even laying into Mark O’Halloran’s kindly priest in one drunken tirade.
While the Dublin portion is shot on location, the Lourdes scenes aren’t, with recreated locations and even green screen for some famous sites, which diminished its authenticity. Once again, the film leans on its cast to overcome its problems.
The film also has a little 1960s-era feminist theme, with the wives going off and leaving their outraged, domestically-helpless husbands to cope with taking care of the kiddies and the house, including diaper changes, shopping and cooking. Although, predictably. this leads to a new appreciation of what their wives deal with daily, these scenes back home also yield some nice comic bits, like a very funny Stephen Rea serving his brood a gray-looking stew while complaining about how hard he worked on it.
While not everything goes smoothly for this gentle film about long-held grudges, self-reflection and potential forgiveness against the backdrop of the famous Catholic pilgrimage site, it does find its way to a warm if expected resolution by the end. The film is really aimed at a certain kind of audience, a more thoughtful, introspective one than an audience looking for an Irish old gal pals kick-up-your-heels comedy trip, along the lines of “80 for Brady.” With its salty language and pointed observations, it might not be for the most devout either. Although there is some snarky jibes (these women are, after all, Irish), those hoping for those sharp-as-glass zingers from Maggie Smith, which she delivered so well in “Downton Abbey,” won’t find them here. Instead, it is Kathy Bates’ character who has the sharp-tongue and she doesn’t hesitate to use it to launch word-bombs, even right there in the church hall. While this is not a unquestioning travel ad for Lourdes, it does treat the religious site with some care, so believers won’t feel uncomfortable in that aspect.
There are things that THE MIRACLE CLUB does get right, like the gritty feel of the low-income Dublin neighborhood, which feels like a village apart from the city itself. The period fashions are well-done, particularly for Agnes O’Casey’s younger Dolly, as well as the sense of women running everything thanklessly for the clueless men, who dismiss their efforts until the women are gone on their trip. Another thing it captures well is the women’s anticipation about what might happen in Lourdes, a mix of religious dreams and real-world doubt. The excitement of the women, whose lives were so hard, just anticipating a night in a hotel, something working-class women of that era might never have done before, is another touch of period realism.
All that means that THE MIRACLE CLUB is not for every audience. There is humor but the film’s thoughtful self-reflective message is the real point.
THE MIRACLE CLUB opens Friday, July 14, in theaters.
RATING: 3 out of 5 stars
