Eat the Peach (1986)

Inspired by the 1964 Elvis Presley movie Roustabout, two young Irish men – Vinnie (Stephen Brennan) and his brother-in-law Arthur (Eamon Morrissey) – build a  motorcycle “wall of death” in the middle of a peat bog.

For Vinnie, riding the wall offers a brief escape from his everyday obligations to family and community and the oppressiveness of his humdrum existence.

Vinnie’s wife Nora (Catherine Byrne) is unimpressed – It’s a new kitchen she wants, not a wall of death – and goes back to her mother with their daughter.

The two men begin smuggling goods across the Irish border to help finance the wall, and try to whip up television coverage and public support.

Sadly, Vinnie’s escape proves all too short, and – although the film ends on an optimistic note – he crashes back down to earth.

Despite its commercial ambitions (this was arguably the most overtly commercial film to be funded by the first Irish Film Board), Eat The Peach eschews any classic Hollywood narrative.

Stephen Brennan’s performance is so low-key as to be invisible, with his motives explained less by overt dialogue and more by shots sticking him in the middle of a flat landscape that stretches to the horizon.

The charming movie captures a rural Ireland frequently sidelined in cinematic representations, which, no doubt, contributed to its massive domestic success.

Conversely, its refusal to countenance a Ryan’s Daughter-style or representation probably sealed its fate outside Ireland, where the film failed to make an impact.

Directed by Peter Ormrod, this tragi-comedy is based on a true story – Connie Kiernan and Michael Donoghue actually did build a wall of death in their back garden in Granard, County Longford (Ireland) in the 1970s.

Shooting for Eat The Peach took place on location in the Bog of Allen, County Kildare, and in Counties Dublin, Meath and Wicklow, Ireland.

Vinnie
Stephen Brennan
Arthur
Eamon Morrissey
Nora
Catherine Byrne
Boots
Niall Toibin
Boss Murtagh
Joe Lynch
Sean Murtagh
Tony Doyle
Bunzo
Takashi Kawahara
Vicky
Victoria Armstrong
Mrs Fleck
Barbara Adair
Nuala
Bernadette O’Neill
O’Hagan
Paul Raynor
Quiz Master
Martin Dempsey
Priest
Maeliosa Stafford
Aileen
Jill Doyle
Journalist
Don Foley
Danny
Brian J Hogg
TV Reporter
Pat Kenny
TV Cameraman
Barry Kelley
TV Soundman
Edmund Lynch
Cahill
Ronan Wilmot

Director
Peter Ormrod

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