It goes about as well as a film about Mickey Rourke playing an ex-IRA hitman who falls in love with the blind daughter of an ex-paratrooper priest played by Bob Hoskins can reasonably be expected to go.

martin mcdonagh watched this and said hold my beer

I feel there was potential for a film with the same story, but a completely different execution. Once I saw the plot "An IRA assassin changes his ways after accidentally blowing up a school bus full of kids", I thought this was going to be some wonderfully tasteless '80s action, instead it was a really dull drama.

I would have been fine with this had the execution been better, but aside from a decent performance from Mickey Rourke (Holy fuck, he looked different), this was just boring and at times just strange.

This needs a remake in the style of Hobo With a Shotgun.

There used to be a time when Mickey Rourke actually did act, and he did it wonderfully. Although his best performance for me is still Angel heart, his performance as IRA hitman Martin Fallon in A prayer for the Dying is excellent and is in my personal top 5 Mickey Rourke's movies.

Somehow though this movie, despite strong appearances from Bob Hoskins, Liam Neesom (how young he looks!) and Alan Bates, didn't
receive the love I feel it deserves!

Excellent friday night movie and highly recommended to those who want to see some early work from an actor who used to be great.

martin mcdonagh watched this and said hold my beer

It had pontential but didn’t go he full length. Gotta give it some love though for Mickey, Liam, Bob and Conti's soundtrack

Cute, but In Bruges is clearly the superior remake.

There's a great film to be found here, it's just a shame that instead of that we get what amounts to a bad 80s action thriller without any wit or insight into the troubles in the North. It's a political drama that is almost without any political viewpoint or ideas. Rourke is good and the supporting cast do well though Hopkins and Sammi Davis as his blind niece are both miscast with the Davis, in particular, delivering a performance that is borderline comical. It's just a shame that pretty much all the character work of the novel is absent and in its place, we have the most banal 80s thriller ever.

I feel like I slept through this entire movie despite being completely awake.

It was so painfully boring and provided so little to latch onto, there are a few decent performances and so many bad performances, the villain feels like he came from a lesser Bond film, think early 80s Roger Moore.

Mickey Rourke would have been okay if he didn't try to do an Irish accent which was just abysmal and Bob Hoskins is always great even when given a bad script.

A famously compromised production. Imagine The Crying Game without the progressive sexual politics, the multi-layered emphasis on 'divides' & disparities (geographical, political, sexual, etc) or the clever mirroring of its various characters, & replace with an unconvincing love story, meandering plot & depiction of a violent underworld that feels derivative of Hodges' own classic, Get Carter.

"I don't think you know exactly who I am, father."

A small scale British crime film with a cool cast of Rourke, Neeson, and Hoskins, 'A Prayer for the Dying' has the same writer as 'Eagle Has Landed' and director as 'Croupier', so there's some "coolness" quality and talented intrigue. It may get a tad too dramatic for its own good like the bling neice, but it's altogether an intimate flick with a good story.

Bob Hoskins giving a beatdown at the pub is cinematic glory.

This review may contain spoilers. I can handle the truth.

Whilst the film boasts a strong cast and interesting story, if failed to deliver for me.