June 13

Today’s entry in the June Swoon is a historical drama that was available on Hulu entitled Small Things Like These, starring Cillian Murphy, hot off his Oscar win for Oppenheimer.

According to IMDB, “In 1985 devoted father Bill Furlong discovers disturbing secrets kept by the local convent and uncovers shocking truths of his own.”

Cillian Murphy has placed himself square in the upper echelon of actors working today and this is one more outstanding and very subtle and sublime performance.

The movie deals with the concept of the Magdalene laundries, which according to Wikipedia, “were institutions usually run by Roman Catholic orders” which were “run ostensibly to house ‘fallen women’, an estimated 30,000 of whom were confined in these institutions in Ireland.”

“In 1993, unmarked graves of 155 women were uncovered in the convent grounds of one of the laundries. This led to media revelations about the operations of the secretive institutions.“

This was a bit of history that I did not know about and it was a truly harrowing tale. Cillian Murphy is remarkable with the backdrop of this history in the foreground of this movie. There are flashbacks used to Murphy’s character’s, Bill, childhood.

This is a small film but it carried a strong message about a terrible time in the world, including the potential questions that this could raise about religion and belief in such.