When we think of Irish movies, we think of “The Troubles,” “The Quiet Man,” “The Commitments,” the Catholics, the Protestants, Kenneth Branagh’s “Belfast?” Several of the thematic elements driving the aforementioned are in play in Thaddeus O’Sullivan’s 1967-set “The Miracle Club,” a miniature, Irish “Canterbury Tales” about a small group of working-class women from Ballygar in outer Dublin, where the film was shot, who go on a long-awaited pilgrimage to Lourdes in France, where they confront one another and their past lives.
Aged Lily Fox (Maggie Smith), who has a bad leg, has still not recovered from the 40-year-old loss of her son Declan, He was involved with a local girl named Chrissie (Laura Linney), and he drowned off a local beach (there is a small plaque commemorating the event on a pier). Chrissie, meanwhile, fled to America under a cloud of scandal.
When the action begins, Chrissie surprisingly returns to attend her mother’s funeral and stays for the trip to Lourdes. Dolly (Agnes O’Casey) is a hard-pressed young mother who wants to go to Lourdes to seek a miracle for her small son Daniel (Eric D. Smith), who does not speak. Eileen Dunne (Kathy Bates), who has a large family and has not been getting along with her husband Frank (Stephen Rea), has had a cancer scare and wants to go to Lourdes to seek a cure. I’m not sure I bought the idea that Lily, Dolly and Eileen have formed a karaoke trio performing The Chiffons’ “He’s So Fine” (a bit evoking “The Commitments”) at the church talent contest. Once upon a time, Eileen, Chrissie and Declan were dear friends. Declan’s death drove a wedge between Eileen and Chrissie.
The bus journey to southeast France and the Pyrenees is the first reunion of the women. In Lourdes, they stay at the Hotel de Bernadette, naturally. There is a lavish gift shop, trips to the famous grotto, where the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to 14-year-old Bernadette Soubirous in 1858, and nuns. Eileen refers to the lavish 1943 drama, “The Song of Bernadette” with first-timer Jennifer Jones, who won a best actress Academy Award, beating out Ingrid Berman, Greer Garson, Joan Fontaine and Jean Arthur.
Written by Joshua D. Maurer, TV veteran Timothy Prager and actor Jimmy Smallhorne, “The Miracle Club” is a bit of a free-for-all. We’ve got the beloved, but also a befuddled local priest Father Dermot Byrne (Mark O’Halloran) and Lily’s not-very-well-developed relationship with her husband (Niall Buggy, “Mamma Mia!”). Eileen confronts the nuns at Lourdes and learns that there have been only 62 cures since 1858. Back in Ballygar, Dolly’s oafish husband George (Mark McKenna) guzzles beers as he babysits their newborn. A drunken Lily curses out the priest, Lily and Chrissie. But I wasn’t sure why. While “The Miracle Club” is no “The Banshees of Inisherin,” you can’t lose with a cast like this. Newcomer O’Casey, the great granddaughter of Irish playwright Sean O’Casey (“Juno and the Paycock”), makes quite an impression as the unfulfilled local beauty. What are the odds Dolly’s son Daniel is going to say something before the end? Can you guess what it might be?
(“The Miracle Club” contains mature themes and some harsh language)
Rated PG-13. At the AMC Boston Common and suburban theaters. Grade: B