Netflix And Chill: In The Land Of Saints And Sinners (2023)

I'm not one to usually worry about films being offensive. Nothing much bothers me, I'm in the main demographic for characters who aren't used as punchlines, and I've watched far too many Troma movies to be bothered by tastelessness or mishandling of potentially sensitive issues. So I hope you understand how much thought I gave it before I decided that In The Land Of Saints And Sinners feels offensively bad in the way it uses the Troubles in Ireland as a backdrop for what becomes yet another standard Liam Neeson thriller. It didn't personally bother me, but I have a lot of friends over the water I can imagine may be a bit irked by this, to put it mildly.

Neeson plays Finbar Murphy, a man who lives in County Donegal, working as a contract killer for a local crime boss (played by the superb Colm Meaney). Murphy starts off a violent chain of events when he voluntarily helps an abusive prick shuffle off this mortal coil. Unfortunately, that abusive prick was the brother of a strong-willed terrorist (Doireann, played by Kerry Condon), which leads to her, and her accomplices, working to find the killer, no matter who else gets caught up in the crossfire.

While this feels like an accomplished debut from director Robert Lorenz, it isn't. He may not have too many credits to his name, but Lorenz has been around long enough to hone his skills. The same can be said of writer Terry Loane. It's co-writer Mark Michael McNally who is the first-timer, which makes me wonder if he was the person who came up with the sorely-misjudged main premise (although maybe I am just viewing it that way because it feels a bit closer to home than other films that have used similar backgrounds for some kind of redemption story arc).

The cast all do good work, with both Condon and Neeson on top form, and emanating an undeniably powerful energy in the scenes that have them facing one another. Meaney is always a great presence onscreen, Jack Gleeson does a great job in the role of a young man who doesn't consider how he might end up one day regretting his actions, and Ciarán Hinds is a friendly local Garda officer. There are also good performances from Desmond Eastwood, Niamh Cusack, Michelle Gleeson, Sarah Greene, and everyone else filling out the cast of supporting characters.

I'd be very interested to hear from others who watched this, and especially any of my pals over on the Emerald Isle. Am I wrong for wanting this to have been better, for wanting it to justify the use of the events used as the background to the story? It could have been tweaked so easily, and I don't think there would have been anything lost (especially if Neeson had the same background to his character). In fact, it could have possibly even been improved by setting it in the here and now, showing people who refused to let go of some old tactics while the older and wiser heads remembered how many lives were shattered and destroyed by their actions.

Competent, technically-speaking, but fairly incompetent when you consider the decisions made at the writing stage, this is somehow more egregious than the dozen or more Neeson movies that simply try to replicate the success of the Taken series. Or maybe it's just me thinking that way.

4/10

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