This film would have benefited from a considerably lighter hand.
From the first quarter-hour of the film, I couldn't imagine it getting
much bleaker, but it did. The Magdalene laundries must have
been grim places to work, and to be held captive in -- until 1955,
families weren't allowed to remove their own daughters, etc. -- but I
wondered if every Irish Catholic nun during that era (1960s) was
really the meanest and most sadistic creature on earth. I also
found it misleading to be presented with biographical "data" on
four of the women near the film's end, only to read in the credits
that all the characters were completely fictitious. (Is this a legal
obfuscation?)
From the first quarter-hour of the film, I couldn't imagine it getting
much bleaker, but it did. The Magdalene laundries must have
been grim places to work, and to be held captive in -- until 1955,
families weren't allowed to remove their own daughters, etc. -- but I
wondered if every Irish Catholic nun during that era (1960s) was
really the meanest and most sadistic creature on earth. I also
found it misleading to be presented with biographical "data" on
four of the women near the film's end, only to read in the credits
that all the characters were completely fictitious. (Is this a legal
obfuscation?)