I thought I'd give you my take on Cate Blanchett's new movie 'Veronica Guerin' (SPOILERS included).

Perhaps I'm a biased reviewer, as Veronica's life, work, and even death were such a part of my consciousness as a teenager. Her audacity and courage were a breath of fresh air in what is still a very controlled society, especially in the media. Her murder caused such a shockwave across the country, its effect has been compared to the grief Americans felt after JFK's death.

Anyway, the film. To say my expectations were high would be an understatement. Perhaps they were unfairly so, as I so was familiar with all the facts of the case and basically thought "With such dramatic source material, how could they go wrong?" The great Cate Blanchett could not fail to do justice to Veronica's guts and intelligence. Joel Schumacher as director and Jerry Bruckheimer producing were not good portents butsurely the material would rise above their characteristically ham-fisted respective styles. Perhaps even their outsider perspective would lend an insight into Irish society - absent from most Irish films with their Tourist Board mentality.

The basic story is this: In 1995, Veronica Guerin, an untrained Dublin journalist began writing a series of articles for the Sunday Independent, giving startling insights into the lives of Dublin gangland figures. Due to stifling libel laws, she was forced to call them by nicknames given to them by their cronies: The Penguin, The Coach, The Monk, Dutchy, The General. She got information from several insiders in the criminal world, including John "The Coach" Traynor, played in the film by Ciarán Hinds. He would feed her information on other criminals, including the feared John Gilligan (Gerard McSorely). He also strung her along, giving her false information to please his bosses. Veronica began to recognise the different grades of criminal in Dublin, from "Ordinary Decent Criminals" like The Coach, to the rich, untouchable Gilligan, who flooded the city with cannabis (it's heroin in the film). She even began to have respect for men like The Monk, who abhorred drugs, seeing the destruction they wrought on communities. Veronica had a similar hatred for drugs and the horrifying effect they had on her beloved city.

Such nuances are lost in the adaptation, though. Cate Blanchett plays Guerin as a (God help us) feisty colleen, one of the boys, who uses her personality and good looks to get the dirt on the crime kingpins. It's not her fault, though, as the script paints Veronica in broad stokes, giving Cate little to do but wrap her tongue around the Irish accent. This she does, fairly well, having researched the character quite thoroughly, but it struck me as a rather mannered, even cold performance, without the warmth and Northside charm of the journalist. The story follows the basic events of Guerin's life in her final two years fairly directly - her increasing celebrity status, the threats and the attacks on her home, the shocking attack where she was shot in the leg, and another when Gilligan himself beat her senseless when she came to his house to question him, and, of course, her brutal murder. I found this disappointing as I already know her story, and though it's dramatic to me, the truth is, as obvious as it sounds, real life just isn't dramatic on the big screen. There has to be some, well, drama to it. This is one of the reasons the overall effect of Veronica Guerin the movie was quite amateurish to me.

Other reasons are the superficial characterisation and the direction. The villians are cartoonish in the extreme, Gerard McSorely's Gilligan has a habit of smashing things, or flying at people if he gets upset. It was surprised he didn't turn green and burst out of his shirt at one point. McSorely is a restrained actor, and this Hollywood gangster stuff didn't suit him. Otherwise, I found he gave a performance quite frightening in its intensity. The film was littered with cliches, from the understanding husband to the nice-guy editor, and a murder in a bar features a barmaid (you guessed it) screaming at the top of her lungs in true Fay Wray style.

The theme is DRUG DEALERS ARE BAD, but also DRUDS ARE BAD, thank you Mr. Schumacher, we wouldn't know that without you hammering it home at every opportunity. The ground outside a poverty-stricken flat complex is covered in syringes, kids play with discarded syringes, kids shoot up in every corner. This place has a drug problem, GEDDIT?The acting was of a high level, throughout, and I was grateful for the absence of the usual stereotypes of bumbling but lovable Gardaí, politicians etc who are simutaneously full of wit and wisdom. Dramatically, it was quite confusing, but still the final attack on Guerin before her death, and her death itself were quite chilling, despite Munchkin Boy wailing in the background.

The soundtrack was otherwise quite effective, diddley-eye kept to a minimum, but the ubiquitous squawker Sinéad O'Connor inevitably made an appearence. Her lament in Irish over the funeral was lovely, though.

I should also mention that my lovely Laurence Kinlan makes a brief appearence as Timmy, a young junkie that Guerin meets early on. Though his character barely registers due to its brevity, he infuses it with tragedy. I hope he won't get typecast as drug-addled teenagers, though, he's far too talented too be wasted (no pun intended) on such limited parts. That's it, hope you can make sense of it.