In my opinion Mickey Rourke's third best movie, the first being "Angel Heart" and the second being "Year of the Dragon".
Rourke teamed up with Mike Hodges the director of such classics as "Get Carter" and the more recent "Croupier" in April of 1986 in London.
The whole movie was filmed on location in London, the Irish scenes at the beginning were filmed probably in Herts. The actual church is in Canning in London, near the ill fated Millennium Dome and still stands today. It wasn't being used as a church at the time, and the roof damage was real due to a bombing in the second world war. The church still stands and is currently used as a community centre.
Rourke plays Martin Fallon an IRA terrorist with a heart who recently bombed a school bus by accident and fled to London to evade the IRA and start again. He is taken on by local kingpin Jack Meehan played by a very camp Alan Bates whom has a day job of a funeral director and by night a nasty villain who wants Fallon to do one last job and he will pay him well and give him a passport and ticket to the US.
The mark Fallon is to kill is another local kingpin whom Meehan wants dead so he can take over his drug business. The mark he has to kill always visits his mother in a local church where Fallon shoots him, but is seen by Father Da Costa played very well by Bob Hoskins. Da Costa won't co-operate with the police after hearing Fallon's confession and the whole movie then is based around Jack Meehan trying to kill Fallon and the Da Costa.
Rourke's accent is spot on, maybe not to a true Irishman, but certainly to most it is very good, and his acting is on top form.
Hoskins is believable and carries of being a vicar fairly well, and the script also tells he is an ex army officer which gives him a bit of reason to be little rough on some of the villains.
Look out for a young Anthony Head (from Buffy) and a blind Sammi Davis whom was very popular in a lot of Ken Russell movies from the early 90's.
