Parky at the Pictures (DVD 6/12/2018)

But film-makers have largely steered clear of the Great Hunger (1845-49), which reduced the country's population by a quarter, as around a million died and the same number emigrated after losing their livelihoods and homes. A rare exception is the BBC drama, The Hanging Gale (1995), which is set in Donegal in 1846 and stars the four McGann brothers as the Phelan siblings fighting against a callous British land agent. But it's now been joined by Lance Daly's Black 47, which recasts events in Connemara during the worst year of the Potato Famine as a Bog Western in the mould of John Hillcoat's Bush odyssey, The Proposition (2005).

Returning home after deserting from the British army in India, Martin Feeney (James Frecheville) discovers that the family cottage has been tumbled and further learns from a neighbour (Andrew Bennett) that not only has his mother died of the fever, but that his brother has also been hanged. Sister-in-law Ellie (Sarah Greene) takes Martin home and introduces him to his nephew and two nieces. The boy shares his father's distaste for the fact that Martin took the Queen's shilling and sits sullenly by the fire, as his uncle and mother sing old Gaelic songs. 

The following day, Ellie shows Martin around the decimated village and explains how the potato blight destroyed the crop and left hundreds starving. His mother perished because she wouldn't eat stolen food for fear of going to Hell and he informs her that he plans to emigrate to America. On returning to the cottage, however, Martin sees constables arresting his nephew for theft and he is pinned to the floor when they gun the boy down. Taken to the cells in the town, Martin breaks his way to freedom and returns to the tumbled cottage to find Ellie and her daughters frozen in the corner. Removing the bullets from his arm, he goes in search of the neighbour who has been keeping pigs in his mother's home. When he pulls a pistol on him, Martin stabs him with his trusty sword and mounts his horse to find Judge Bolton (Dermot Crowley), who had sentenced his brother.

Meanwhile, Inspector Hannah (Hugo Weaving) has been released from prison, where he is awaiting execution for killing a prisoner he was interrogating. He is paired with Captain Pope (Freddie Fox) in order to capture Martin, whom he knows from their time together in Afghanistan. As they travel by train, an Irish journalist asks Pope about the causes of the Famine and he quotes the Bible to him in suggesting that the peasants were victims of their own ignorance. Arriving at the local barracks, Pope enlists Private Hobson (Barry Keoghan) to look after their horses and they ride past the window where Bolton is hanging from a rope. Sergeant Fitzgibbon (Moe Dunford) blames a Connaught Ranger for the crime and for the torching of his police station. But Pope refuses to confirm whether Martin is the man he seeks. 

Arriving in the village, Hannah and Pope discover that the neighbour has been decapitated and has a pig's head resting on his shoulder. Local Conneely (Stephen Rea) reveals that he was the rent collector for Lord Kilmichael (Jim Broadbent) and they find his severed head on a spike inside the Feeney home. Conneely offers to ride along with the lawmen to act as translator and pockets a few coins proffered by Hannah for his information. As they sit by the fire that night, Hannah tells Hobson about Martin saving his life in Kabul and declares him the best soldier with whom he served. The only trouble was that he fought for his mates and not for the crown. 

Nearby, Martin shelters from a downpour in a tent where a Protestant preacher is offering soup to anyone who will renounce their Catholic faith. A priest stands at the entrance pleading with his starving parishioners not to enter. But Martin strides in and helps himself to a bowl of broth and turfs the preacher out when he reminds him that the needs of the soul should take priority over the longings of the flesh. 

The next morning, he rides to the house of Cronin (Aidan McArdle), who is Kilmichael's land agent and was responsible for evicting both his mother and Ellie. He ambushes him in the barn and suffocates him in the grain that the landlord has harvested for export. However, before he can make his escape, Pope, Hannah and Hobson reach the farmhouse and rides into the courtyard. Martin shoots Pope's horse from beneath him and lays low while Hannah and Hobson search the stables. But, when he rides out and recognises Hannah, Martin opts to hit him in the face with a rifle butt rather than shoot him and he faces Hobson down in order to make his getaway. Pope is furious with them for letting the fugitive flee, but he also missed with a clear shot as Martin was galloping through the gates. 

Reaching Kilmichael's estate, they are surprised to find Fitzgibbon in his study. He accuses Pope of endangering the nobleman's life in the pursuit of glory and Kilmichael avers that he has no intention of being cowed by a renegade soldier. Outside, Hobson is dismayed to see peasants looking through the gates, as sacks of grain are loaded for export. A set-to develops when he vows to help the starving and Hannah is aghast when Fitzgibbon's men gun the private down and Kilmichael congratulates them on their swift action. 

Pope and Hannah join Kilmichael in his carriage, as he accompanies the grain consignment across country to Dublin. As they drive, Kilmichael doubts whether anyone could get close enough to shoot him through the window and he feels safe at the inn after Fitzgibbon conducts a thorough inspection. He sits by the fire drinking with Conneely, who tells him risqué stories until Kilmichael suggests that no Irish girl could ever by as pretty as an English maiden. Conneely declares that he would be hard pressed to tell the difference if the rose had to live in the same squalor as a colleen and, when Kilmichael professes to love this beautiful country, Conneely proclaims that the Irish would like it more if beauty was edible. 

Pope asks Hannah if his heart is still in the mission, after Martin had taken him by surprise at the campfire the previous evening and admonished him for agreeing to track him down. Hannah acknowledges his debt to Martin and wishes his superiors had recognised his heroism rather than dismissing him as a mongrel. But he swears to not to leave without him, as the Irishman laments the lack of justice for his kinfolk and curses the hypocritical difference that the British discern between acts of war that are rewarded with medals and crimes of survival that are punished by death. 

After lights out, Martin creeps into the hotel and makes his way to Kilmichael's room. When he pulls back the covers, however, he finds Pope waiting for him. Hannah emerges from the shadows with a rifle, as Kilmichael and Fitzgibbon enter the chamber to see what the fuss is about. Much to Pope's fury, Hannah refuses to shoot and Martin is able to escape with Kilmichael as his hostage. They ride to the abandoned cottage, where Martin insists on speaking Gaelic and Kilmichael refuses to be cowed. 

Accusing him of treachery, Pope puts Hannah before a firing squad at dawn. But, as he is lined up against a wall, Martin appears on the rooftop and takes out the sergeant and one of the marksmen. Conneely watches on, as peasants try to break down the gates and get at the grain store, and he flinches as a hooded rider gallops into the courtyard. Pope orders his men to fire, only to discover that he has gunned down Kilmichael. As Martin and Fitzgibbon fight in the barn, Conneely cuts Hannah's handcuffs and he rides to his old comrade's rescue. Martin shoots Pope in the shoulder and he is powerless to stop the pair fleeing on horseback. 

Reaching the sanctuary of the wilderness, Hannah lies Martin on the muddy ground. He dies after urging Hannah to go to America rather than waste his time with vendettas. As Pope rides alone with a sling over his scarlet tunic, Fitzgibbon leads Kilmichael's funeral cortège past the pub in which Conneely is drinking. Refugees rest on the road and Hannah rides up to them, as he sees Pope in the near distance. He pauses and considers which road to take, as the screen cuts to black and a caption dedicating the film to those who lose their lives in the Famine and those who left Ireland and never returned. 

Since his hard-to-see debut, Last Days in Dublin (2001), Lance Daly has produced four very varied features in The Halo Effect (2004), Kisses (2008), The Good Doctor (2011) and Life's a Breeze (2013). All but the third were characterised by their offbeat humour and there was certainly nothing in their stories about a Dublin chip shop, a couple of Christmas runaways and a missing mattress to foreshadow a relentlessly grim saga that imposes a generic narrative on to a national tragedy. 

Although Daly and co-scenarists PJ Dillon, Pierce Ryan and Eugene O'Brien deserve credit for bringing the Famine to wider attention during another migrant crisis, their plot is frustratingly formulaic and their characterisation is sketchy in the extreme. This doesn't mean that the action doesn't grip or that the performances are not admirable. But there is nothing remotely new about a vigilante finding ironically gruesome methods of bumping off his victims or about his pursuers being reprehensible symbols of the system against which the anti-hero is kicking. 

Despite snippets being dropped in the dialogue, we learn little about Martin as either a son or a soldier and James Frecheville's Eastwoodian taciturnity ensures that he remains remote throughout. Looking like Sam Neill and sounding like Timothy Spall, fellow Aussie Hugo Weaving proves equally enigmatic as Hannah, while Jim Broadbent and Freddie Fox are asked to do little more than play hissable imperialist toffs and it's hard to suppress a laugh at the clumsiness of Kilmichael's hope that `a Celtic Irishman in Ireland will be as rare a sight as a Red Indian in Manhattan'. But Conneely's songs and anecdotes allow Stephen Rea to suggest an inner life, as he treads the fine line between being a partisan and a quisling. 

Often draining colour from the landscape, cinematographer Declan Quinn conveys the bleakness of the ravaged countryside. But the CGI crofts are far from convincing and undermine Waldemar Kalinowski's otherwise impressive production design. Magdalena Labuz's costumes are also effective, with the drab shades of the peasant rags contrasting starkly with the scarlet and gold of the British uniforms and the green on the constabulary caps. But Brian Byrne's repeated use of Uilleann pipes makes the score feel tritely twee rather than authentic or atmospheric. So, while this admirably paced and morally well-meaning account has much to commend it, it's a solid film rather than an important one.

Since playing English teacher David Wilder in Dawson's Creek, Ken Marino has been a familiar face on our television screens. In addition to recurring roles in Party Down, Marry Me, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, Fresh Off the Boat and Agent Carter, however, Marino has earned three Emmy nominations as the producer of the sitcom Children's Hospital and the web series, Burning Love. Moreover, he has also based Katherine Dieckmann's Diggers (2006) on his father's exploits as a clam digger in the 1970s and made his directorial debut with How to Be a Latin Lover (2017). Working from a script he reworked with wife Erica Oyama from a Elissa Matsueda original, he returns behind the camera for Dog Days, which has been described in some quarters as a `canine Love Actually'.

Elizabeth (Nina Dobrev) is so devoted to her dog Sam that she leaves the television on so that he can watch her presenting a Los Angeles daytime show. He barks when an interview with dog psychologist Danielle (Tig Notaro) goes badly and, when she gets home, he brings her the pink bra belonging to the  girl sleeping with her boyfriend, Peter (Ryan Hansen). While Danielle reassures Elizabeth that Sam's broken heart will mend, barista Tara (Vanessa Hudgens) moons over vet Dr Mike (Michael Cassidy) and fails to notice that regular customer Garrett (Jon Bass) is besotted with her. When she finds skinny stray Gertrude at the back of the coffee shop, Tara follows the advice of dog-walking best friend Daisy (Lauren Lapkus) and takes her to the clinic to introduce herself. However, Dr Mike is too much of an animal person to realise she's flirting with him and suggests it might be better to find Gertrude another home, as Tara can't keep pets in her digs. 

The same problem besets Dax (Adam Pally), who is left in charge of Charlie when sister Ruth (Jessica St Clair) goes into labour with twins while ranting at him for missing her baby shower. Henpecked husband Greg (Thomas Lennon) bundles her into the car, while Dax wonders what he's going to do with a pooch with a penchant for chewing things. A new arrival is also expected by adoptive parents Grace (Eva Longoria) and Kurt (Rob Corddry). But, even though they have filled her room with toys, Amelia (Elizabeth Phoenix Caro) is nervous about settling into her new home and sits timidly on the edge of the bed with a cuddly blue dog.

Across town, Walter (Ron Cephas Jones) is having to get used to being alone after the death of his wife. His sole companion is a podgy pug named Mabel. But she runs away when he has a seizure while out walking and 16 year-old pizza delivery boy Tyler (FinnWolfhard) feels responsible for finding her, as she charged across the street in recognition when he called out to Walter, who is one of his regular customers. Tara also feels guilty about letting Gertrude go to a rescue pound, as she has a fragile skull and has to wear a pink plastic helmet to protect her. Much to her surprise, Tara discovers that New Tricks is owned by Garrett, who is delighted when she asks if she can volunteer. 

While his mood improves, Grace becomes increasingly stressed at not being able to connect with Amelia, in spite of dancing to `Wannabe' by The Spice Girls during breakfast. Elizabeth is also feeling glum, as she swears on air when ex-basketball star Jimmy (Tone Bell) winds her up during an interview. She is even more put out when she hosts a birthday party for Sam in the parkk and he begins frolicking around with Brandy, who just happens to belong to Jimmy. Amy (Jessica Lowe), her make-up artist friend is amused, but Elizabeth is most decidedly not, as Sam hasn't been so sprightly since Peter left. However, she discovers she is going to be seeing a lot more of Jimmy, as he has just been made her new co-host.

Meanwhile, Amelia has found Mabel and Grace and Kurt are so touched by the way she chatters to her that they agree to let her stay. However, Tyler is still helping Walter search for her, although they have forged another bond because Tyler lost his father four years ago and Walter can help him with his summer studies because he's a retired English professor. Dax and Charlie have also become pals, even though the dog dawdles to sniff trees during his morning walks and keeps stopping Dax from canoodling with the girls he brings back to his apartment.

However, Ruth is too exhausted to take Charlie back and Dax gets caught smuggling him back into the building by Tara, who mace sprays him because she thinks he's abducted a person. As they use frozen peas to cool their eyes, Tara asks Dax to bring his band, Frunk, to the fundraiser she's organising with Garrett to help New Tricks relocate after the landlord sold their premises. However, Dr Mike is also keen to get involved and he makes a play for Tara, who can't resist, even though she's been coming to realise what a nice guy Garrett is. 

Elizabeth reaches the same conclusion about Jimmy when he humiliates Peter when they bump into him in a pet store. They become lovers, as well as partners and all seems to be going smoothly, even though nobody seems to have noticed how lonely weather presenter Alexa (Phoebe Neidhardt) is. However, it all goes wrong on air during an interview with clown Wacky Wayne (David Wain), when Elizabeth confronts Jimmy about being headhunted by another channel and she suggests backstage that they take a step back. Kurt also has a dilemma to address when he meets up with Tyler at the start of the new school term and sees one of the flyers he is posting about Mabel.

However, Amelia takes the news very well and is happy that Mr Snuggles (as she has renamed Mabel) will be reunited with Walter. He has gone to the party in the park with Tyler and admits that he feels he has let his wife down by losing her beloved pet. But he is enjoying reconnecting with the world and is even considering adopting a new dog from New Tricks. Daz has also become attached to Charlie (even panicking after he trips out on a hash brownie scarfed during a band rehearsal) and takes him to the benefit, which Jimmy is reporting on while grieving for Brandy, who had to be put down after suffering a stroke while playing fetch on the beach. With Sam giving her the big sad eyes, Elizabeth dashes to the park to tells Jimmy she loves him, while Garrett gives Tara a pen engraved with Gertrude Stein's delightful line, `I am because my little dog knows me.'

Kurt calls Walter while he's watching old home movies of his wife and her yellow Volkswagen. They meet in the park, but he sees how much Mabel means to Amelia and suggests they stay together and he can say `hello' whenever they run into each other. Grace is overwhelmed and Amelia hugs her because she has now accepted her as her mom. Even Daz sheds a tear when he leaves Charlie with Ruth. 

One year later, New Tricks has moved into Walter's sprawling home and he is pleased to be able to see it so full of life again. Garrett and Tara are still an item, while Daisy has snagged Dr Mike. Gertrude is watching TV when Jimmy proposes to Elizabeth live on air and she and Sam give him a new dog to complete their family. So, everyone is content, as the credits roll with a selection of out-takes that probably should have been left as extras for the DVD release. 

Strictly, disc is where this genial, but lightweight charmer belongs. There's nothing remotely cinematic about Marino's visual style, with the images being lit and framed like a teleplay. However, the screenplay is solidly structured and, while the plot strands are pretty formulaic, they slot together pleasingly enough, thanks to the efforts of an admirable ensemble. Ironically, for a film that sets such store by the importance of our four-legged friends, the canine actors aren't name-checked in the closing crawl, which is doubly disappointing, as they steal every scene they are in. 

Despite distancing herself from her Desperate Housewives persona, Eva Longoria struggles to suggest the anxieties experienced by an adoptive mother trying to connect with her child, while Nina Dobrev and Vanessa Hudgens are almost interchangeable as the LA cuties who keep choosing the wrong hunk. A similar whiff of chauvinism informs Jessica St Clair's display as the shrewish mother-to-be, although this vignette does allow Marino to slip in a clip from John De Bello's Attack of the Killer Tomatoes (1978), as Adam  Pally is helping Charlie down from his snaffled high. The weakest segment is also the most intriguing, as Ron Cephas Jones's friendship with Finn Wolfhard doesn't ring true for a second. But it raises several social issues that are frustratingly skated over, while it's also the only episode to examine the emotional bond that exists between a dog and their humans.

Icelandic director Árni Ólafúr Ásgeirsson is better known for live-action features like Thicker Than Water (2006) and Undercurrent (2010). However, he tries his hand at animation with Flying the Nest, which has also been released under the title, PLOEY - You Never Fly Alone. 

When a stand of plovers flies back to its northern island home for the summer, Shadow (Richard Cotton) hatches a plot to keep the migrants off his patch. Yet, while the gormless Skua (Kasper Michaels) attempts to act as a decoy, Dad (Thomas Arnold) and Mom (Þórunn Erna Clausen) lead their charges to safety and even have time for a dance before spring cleaning their nest. 

In the blink of an eye, their son Ploey (Jamie Oram) emerges from his shell and starts foraging for himself. During one expedition, he meets Ploeveria (Harriet Perring) and their beaks meet when they slurp down the same worm. They also touch wings while playing in the grass and set off for flying school as the best of friends. But Sloey (Cameron Farrelly) also has his eyes on Ploveria and wastes no time in mocking Ploey when he proves to be scared of flying.

While on nightwatch, Dad is warned by Skua that Shadow is planning an attack and reminds him that he will have to winter in Paradise Valley if he fails to fly south. But Shadow evades the net held by Dad's cohorts and he defeats Dad when he rescues Ploey from a swooping attack. Distraught at costing his father his life, Ploey refuses to leave the nest and is only persuaded to practice flying when Ploeveria reminds him that the time is fast approaching to fly south. While perched on a ledge, however, Ploey loses his nerve and is caught by a prowling grey cat. 

Fortunately, he survives the snatch and wakes at the bottom of a cage inside the cat owner's house. Looking through the window, he sees Ploeveria and his mother flying away and manages to escape from the cage and the bedroom, despite the cat hot being on his tail feathers. Hitting the streets, he meets five chattering bunting birds who use postcards to give him directions to Paradise Valley and Ploey sets out for his destination on foot. He soon wanders into a snowdrift, however, and only keeps out of the clutches of the swooping Shadow with the help of Giron (Iain Stuart Robertson), a ptarmigan who hopes to catch Shadow in a snare he once found on the mountain. 

Giron asks Ploey to act as bait in the trap, but he dozes off while waiting and Ploey wanders away to rescue an Italian rodent, Mousey (Graham Dickson), who has been stranded in the river on a loose piece of ice. Ploey tosses him a twig to make it to dry land, only to drift downstream towards a waterfall and he is only saved from a bath by the diving Giron. Drying his feathers, he tells Ploey that he hates Shadow because he killed his chicks in the nest and he promises him that loved ones who have passed over are looking down on those left behind from the beauty of the Northern Lights. 

No sooner has Giron sung Ploey a song about never flying alone than the one-eyed ptarmigan is pounced upon by a fox (Stefán Karl Stefánsson) and Ploey is left with nothing but his guardian's treasured seashell. He blows into it and Mousey and his acrobatic family appear from nowhere to torment the fox in his lair and allow Ploey to revive Giron and escape. It only proves a temporary reprieve, however, as Ploey gets lost looking for berries while Giron sleeps and winds up bunking down in a nest in a mountain eyrie. 

He is woken by Shadow conversing with what appears to be the ghost of the wife who had died of hunger because he had failed to bring home sufficient food. But Ploey has no time to feel pity for the predator, as Shadow plucks him off the ground to polish him off as a snack. Just as he opens his beak, however, Giron crashes into the nook and Ploey uses one of the cartridge cases the ptarmigan carries to knock Shadow off his stride. 

As they land at the foot of the rocks, Giron wishes Ploey the best of luck before losing consciousness. Thinking he's dead (when he's only resting), Ploey trudges on alone and gets lost in a landscape of forbidding rock formations after the clouds cover the stars by which he is navigating. When he passes out from the cold after having had a nightmare about Ploeveria falling for Sloey), he is picked up by Deer (Colin Mace), who carries him on his antlers to Paradise Valley, where he is greeted by Skua, Mousey, Sheep (Doña Croll), Swan (Debbie Chazen) and Mink (Anna Lawrence). They think he's dead and are bearing him away for burial when Ploey comes round and enjoys the welcome party his new friends throw in his honour. 

As the weeks pass, the sun gets warmer and Skua tells Ploey about the spring and, after Sheep tells him about love giving creatures the power to fly, he vows to return to the nesting grounds to prevent Shadow from stalking his kinfolk. Having survived a test flight by a waterfall, Ploey heads home and arrives in time to see that Giron is still alive and has set his snare for Shadow outside the grey cat's house. Spotting Ploeveria at the head of the returning plovers, Ploey barges into Shadow when he seizes Sloey and entices him into the cat's room after the snare fails to snap. Somehow, Shadow escapes the feline's claws and comes hurtling after Ploey. 

They chase around the town centre before Giron tips Ploey the wink to lead Shadow into the bell in the church tower, which knocks him straight into an open plot in the graveyard. Ploeveria joins Ploey to peer down at Shadow covered in soil. But he still has the strength to reach out a wing and only perishes when Giron plummets down and knocks a wheelbarrow into the grave. Safe to enjoy their summer in peace, Ploey reunites with his mother and gives Giron a goodbye hug before showing Ploeveria how well he has learned to fly. 

Failing to make the imagination soar with either its themes or imagery, this well-meaning, but drab digital animation will only appeal to the least discriminating tinies and they won't care what size screen they see it on. Frequently recalling episodes from the five-strong Ice Age franchise (2002-16), Friðrik Erlingsson's screenplay clings to such storytelling staples as the loss of a parent, the presence of an implacable foe and the protagonist's need to prove something to themselves during a do-or-die quest. But, while the life lessons on offer during Ploey's odyssey are worth learning, Ásgeirsson and Erlingsson struggle to generate much jeopardy, in spite of the fact that Ploey is so small and vulnerable and that the island landscape is every bit as dangerous as Shadow. 

This is partly explained by the bland visuals and the feeble characterisation, which is not helped by the mediocrity of vocal work that is further undermined by the risible variety of accents among the mammals living on an island. One can understand how an Italian mouse and a French swan might have made their way to this remote spot. But a Caribbean sheep? At least we were spared a spirit-boosting reggae number, as the other songs are mawkishly forgettable. So many Euro animations lack personality and this one is no different. Nevertheless, any film that teaches children about overcoming their fears, accepting those different to themselves and fulfilling their potential can't be all bad.