ken you may be british but fuck me u commie cunt i wouldnt claim to be if i was you

Well, that's one ugly and disgusting comment, but I'll leave it there, much as I hate to.

poor cuff. I guess dealing with Britain's colonial and imperial past in Ireland is too much for him. I guess the truth hurts.

I think he would rather watch the Dambusters ;)

This is even more anti-British than a Mel Gibson film (Pro IRA - catholic America will love this).
Poor Irish peasants in flat caps wandering over the green fields of Ireland to fight the evil brits. Arseholes like Kennedy and his NORAID buddies believe that's what it was like right through the 80's and early 90's (Not British soldiers having their legs blown off, RUC men gunned down on their doorsteps and bombing pensioners on rememberance day). It's total one sided bollocks like his other propaganda film 'Hidden Agenda' (Goebbels would have been proud of that one). Aside from entertainment this film has nothing to say, just remember there's always a flipside.

This is beginning to remind me of 2004, when Fahrenheit 9/11 won the Palme d'Or and was immediately attacked; those with an urge to defend it couldn't, really, or couldn't very well, because they hadn't seen it yet.

Here we go again.

I'm Irish myself and as far I can remember from my history this film is quite accurate. Not every situation is real but they are indicative of what was happening at the time. The British sent men to Ireland, many whom were traumatised from fighting in the trenches of WWI. They were not wanted or liked and certainly were attacked. But in response to this they committed many many crimes against the local people. At one point they managed to burn half of Cork city. Simple facts not republic propaganda of any kind. There actions were published on many occasions in the British press and there was even a public backlash in Britain the stories were so bad. It’s history live with it.

Morty, you need to educate yourself and at least have some sort of clue before making ignorant, ranting comments. The collusion between the British secret service, the RUC, UDR and loyalist paramilitiaries (the subject matter of Hidden Agenda) is well documented and not even denied. You'd have to be living on Mars to think said information is propaganda.

Terrible things happen in war and some of the IRA's actions are regretable. But there would not have been a war ever in Ireland if the British would have left us alone. I have lots of British friends and I have always tried to explain the struggle for freedom in Ireland by analogy: I ask, What would you do as a British citizen if the Nazis would have won the Battle of Britain and occupied your country? Would you have sat and done nothing or would you have fought back using what ever means possible to rid yourself of a brutal foreign occupier? The answer to that question is why I have numerous British friends who accept me as an Irish republican and accept the Irish nation's legitimate right to self determination.

It's people like you and the rest of the Sun and Daily Mail readers who need to rid yourselves of the racism and ignorance in which you are steeped.

Having said that you're a fucking wanker.

The British media like to denigrate any film that seeks to shed a light on British involvement in Ireland by resorting to cliches about "romanticism" and "recruting Seargent for the IRA", conveniently overlooking the substance of the issue.

The appalling behaviour of the Black and Tans and auxiliaries is a matter of fact. My grandfather was a child growing up in Fermoy, Cork, and went to school dodging the Tans as they ramsacked the town.

Normally, the British establishment does everything it can to prevent films like this hitting the silver screen, so great credit is due to Ken Loach for managing to get this production made.

The vulgarity, willingness to resort to insults and lack of insight by the detractors in the above posts speak volumes.

Loach backs the Die-Hards against the Staters. He backs the minority of fascist thugs who would not accept the democratic wish of the majority both in the Dail and in the election (where pro-Treaty candidates beat anti-Treaty by 2 to 1).

How does he justify the anti-democratic violence of the Die-Hards? He has a priest supporting the Treaty in a sermon and our hero Damien stands up and says "The people did not vote out of choice, but out of fear". In other words, the fascists know better than the people and so any murders they commit to get what they want are fully justified.

The film makes no mention of the fact that the Northern Protestants did not want to be part of the new independent Ireland. Partition gave the South what it wanted, independence, and what the North wanted, a continuing link with Britain. But Loach does not want a peaceful settlement. He wants a 32-county Socialist Republic and he backs the murderous thugs who have tried (and are still lurking in the shadows) to take by force what they could not win by democratic means.

This is a FILM. THat it needed to be made is obvious from the comments added here so far. Its about the past not the present (or is it??)

My grandfather fought at Gallipoli (1915)and in Mesopotamia (now called IRAQ)in 1917. A Sergeant in the Royal Artillery. A west of Ireland catholic in a british uniform.

He returned from that conflict in late 1917 and ran a "safe house" for the Irish Republican Army members or "on the runs" as they were known, only four doors from the Police Barracks in his home city. He is a classic example of the time. His wife was a fearsome republican with very stong views and extremely tough. She would have become politicised by the events of 1916.

He was soldier of both the Boer War and WW1. He supported his neighbours and his community against the British empire. Many of the "Old IRA" as they came to be known were veterans of the trenches and in many ways were just like their opposites in the Black & Tans. An old IRA veteran now deceased once told me that it was the "lads from the trenches that made the difference as they knew how to behave under fire".

I never supported the latter day violence of Northern Ireland. This FILM is not about that.

The Irish nation includes a community that was inserted by Britain 350 years ago. They were always under threat from the majority on the island. They took and were given opportunities that were not available to the rest at the time.
We must put that behind us now. The republic of Ireland is now a prosperous nation taking in massive immigration from eastern Europe.
This film speaks of the simple visionaries of an Ireland that they could only dream of. We now live that dream in the part of Ireland that is the republic. There is a large and growing community in Northern Ireland who want to be part of that and until they too are accomodated then history can reapeat itself. We have to learn to live together. The decline of Northern Ireland as an economy is continuing and will eventually lead to a new reality dawning. The Republic of Ireland is now becoming multi-ethnic, materialistic and almost aetheistic in many ways.

Ken Loach has told a story in a way that paints brits as bad guys (again). Ken Loach is British.
The Irish did stand up to the United Kingdom and we did fight a civil war/internecine power struggle after independence, these are basic FACTS.
The U.K. of 1920 was the equivalent of the USA to-day in terms of its world position. Remember America had just introduced prohibition and was about to go into a period of isolation from world affairs. The UK navy of 1920 would have beaten the US navy into a tin hat at that time such was the difference in naval strength.

Ken Loach has made a film about the courage it took to take on those odds and the awful price that was paid by all concerned. If you are uncomfortable with the story then "walk a mile in the other man's mocassins" (old native American proverb).
Most Irish people that have come into contact with this film have a lot of good things to say about it. The right wing in Britain still takes its direction from glory days of Empire. My people saw hunger and deprivation, and dispossession to fuel that Empire. We could not and would never accept its right to do these things to us.
NO FILM can ever tell the truth. It tells a story
The word story is the second half of the word "HISTORY". Emotional responses to this film betray a defensiveness or DENIAL that needs to be confronted by the person in denial. I think Ken Loach was holding up the mirror.

I have yet to see this film so cannot comment as to its historic accuracy but no film can ever tell the full story. My knowledge of that period of Irish history comes from my own family history, with family members on both sides of the conflict.

I had great-uncles serving in France fighting on the Somme as their younger brothers a home were involved with the rebels in the 1916 rising.

But getting back to film as history - There are those who believe the 'Braveheart' is true Scottish history so I hope Ken Loache's version of Irish history is more accurate than Mel Gibson's version of Scottish history.

But as for the 'Black and Tans' - here is an extract from a speech made by Lt/Col Smyth, commander of the RIC in Munster, 17 June 1920:

"....If a police barracks is burned or if the barracks already occupied is not suitable, then the best house in the locality is to be commandeered, the occupants thrown into the gutter. Let them die there - the more the merrier. Police and military will patrol the country at least five nights a week. They are not to confine themselves to the main roads, but make across the country, lie in ambush and, when civilians are seen approaching, shout "Hands up!" Should the order be not immediately obeyed, shoot and shoot with effect. If the persons approaching carry their hands in their pockets, or are in any way suspicious-looking, shoot them down. You may make mistakes occasionally and innocent persons may be shot, but that cannot be helped, and you are bound to get the right parties some time. The more you shoot, the better I will like you, and I assure you no policeman will get into trouble for shooting any man ..."