Jamie Dornan, Emily Blunt
“WILD MOUNTAIN THYME” My rating: B-
101 minutes | MPAA rating: PG-13
I was prepared to dislike “Wild Mountain Thyme” as a collection of hoary old cliches about the Irish. Indeed, the movie is crammed with said cliches.
But about halfway through John Patrick Shanley’s film something kicked in and my irritation gave way to a luxurious wallow in romantic sentimentality.
I am ashamed of myself, dear reader, but there you have it.
Shanley, whose career high point remains the Oscar-winning screenplay to 1987’s “Moonstruck” (though one should not dismiss his work a writer/director of 2008’s “Doubt”), attempts here to give us his own “Quiet Man.”
“Wild Mountain Thyme” is a romance crammed with eccentric characters, lots of eye-calming greenery, lilting folk music (especially the haunting title tune), a dispute over farmland and two protagonists who, despite living in the 21st century, appear to have retained their virginity into their mid-30s.
Over aerial views of coastal Ireland a narrator (Christopher Walken) introduces himself as one Tony Reilly, adding “I’m dead.”
Well, death has never stopped an Irishman from talking. From the hereafter the late Tony relates the tale of his son, Anthony (Jamie Dornan), and the girl on the next farm over, Rosemary (Emily Blunt).
Flash back a year. Tony (still alive at this point) is more or less retired. Anthony has been running their farm…badly. He’s a sweet guy but painfully shy and majorly unfocused. How else can you explain living in close proximity to the astounding Rosemary without once picking up a sexual vibe?
As it turns out, Anthony and Rosemary have spent their entire lives in denial that they love one another. Or they know they yearn for each other but won’t admit it.
Butler's Cinema Scene 