‘Four Mothers’: London Review

Dir. Darren Thornton. Republic of Ireland, 2024. 89 mins

YA novelist Edward (James McArdle) is a full-time carer for his mutely-defiant mother Alma (Fionnula Flanagan), who bosses him around from an iPad. Chronically unassertive, he’s become such a pushover that his three friends can’t resist the temptation to ditch their own needy mothers with Edward in order to attend a Pride weekend in Spain. Darren Thornton – together with his writing partner and brother Colin – makes a warm return to the big screen after 2016’s A Date For Mad Mary with Four Mothers, a clearly personal tribute to middle-aged Irish gay men, their working-class matriarchs and what it means to – finally – grow up. 

 There is a maturity here that is born from experience

A loose remake of the small Italian film Mid-August Lunch (2016), the film showcases once again the genial, salty-sweet disposition of the Thornton brothers alongside their ability to draw empathetic performances from their leads — in this case, veteran Irish actress Flanagan and Glasgow’s McArdle, playing a perfect Irishman in his first outright film lead.

Well-known and -respected in theatre, like Andrew Scott and Jack Lowden before him McArdle’s transition to film has similarly been a slower process. You could compare Four Mothers to Scott’s work with John Butler on, say, Handsome Devil, but there is a maturity here that is born from experience. There are laughs to be had, but this story of ageing and assertiveness, transitions and limitations, has a trace-line of authenticity and sadness too. Four Mothers is the kind of film that people find over time, and respond to strongly according to their personal experience: expect a slow burn after its LFF premiere and eventual Irish release.

The writing in Four Mothers is key to its modest successes: it follows a nicely-paced dramatic trajectory, but the dialogue and performances are key. Edward’s debut YA novel – about a young gay couple in Ireland – is suddenly finding a Tik-Tok-led success in America and his publisher wants him to go on a book tour there to capitalise on it. Lacking any kind of self-confidence, Edward struggles with phone-in radio promotional interviews at the same time as he avoids telling Alma that he needs to go away for two weeks, which will involve her moving to a home for respite care.

Eighty-one year-old Alma, mute and wheelchair-bound after a stroke, communicates via an imperiously-rung bell or her robotically-voiced iPad. James finds some sort of companionship with his two gay friends, who also struggle with the care of their mothers, and his psychotherapist who has recently come out at the age of 53. But even they see him as a soft touch, dumping Jean (Dearbhla Molloy), Rosie (Paddy Glynn) and Maud (Stella McCusker) in Edward’s modest bungalow while they run off to Maspalomas Winter Pride for the weekend. Now Edward has three demanding elderly women to take care of as his publisher becomes ever-more insistent and the object of his lust, physical therapist Raf (Gaetan Garcia), prepares to move overseas.

Clearly, Edward is going to have to grow up or grow a pair over the course of the 89-minute film, and it’s testament to McArdle’s sensitive understanding of his character that he keeps the viewer’s sympathy even as patsy Edward agrees to ever-more outrageous demands. The Thornton brothers have given all four women distinct personalities and problems, which adds to the enjoyment of their slow-forming sorority, and the addition of a mini-bus and a road trip to Galway to visit a medium played hilariously by Niamh Cusack keeps the laughs coming. Flanagan is striking in a mute role, conveying the panic, love and selfishness of a wholly- and perhaps happily-dependant woman.

The real achievement of Four Mothers, though, is to take this high, arch concept and turn it into something more subtly loving. How do we best care for ourselves and each other as we get older? It’s not a popular subject in cinema, but this gently-exaggerated scenario has truth at its core and is at least part-based on the Thorntons’ own mother, as well as the Italian source material. Broad though his film might be, Darren Thornton makes it a closely-shot affair across well-rendered interiors, the better to capture the intimacy of the subject matter. Music underscores the humanity at the film’s core. Of course there are laughs here but, like life – and even at Maspalomas Winter Pride – there’s so much more to take into consideration.