The Ballroom of Romance

Now surrounded by younger, prettier women at the dances, she comes to the realisation that all the good men of her generation have emigrated or have been spoken for, and her only remaining hope for marriage is with the alcoholic and unreliable Bowser Egan.The film was shot on location in Ballycroy, County Mayo as by 1982 the ballroom which William Trevor had originally written about had been modernized and no longer resembled a dance hall typical of 1950s Ireland.Bob Geldof described The Ballroom of Romance as his favourite Irish film, "full of that empty, sad despair and hopelessness that is in the character, as evidenced in drink, music, Catholicism, desperate pursuit of ‘the craic’ and dangerously overwrought politics.[8] Scholarly analysis has noted that the film was produced at a time when Ireland was beginning to become a wealthy, industrialised nation, as European Economic Community membership brought factories and development.Luke Gibbons wrote that it "provided a focus for the reassuring belief that the fifties were no longer with us... Viewers could confront the harsh realities of poverty, emigration, sexual repression and the enforced domestication of women, secure in the knowledge that ‘The factory was coming to town.’"[4]
RTÉ GuideWilliam TrevorPat O'ConnorBrenda FrickerJohn KavanaghCyril CusackBrid BrennanMick LallyJoe PilkingtonIngrid Craigietelevision filmBritish Academy Television AwardBest Single DramaCounty LeitrimNiall ToibinIrelandBallycroyCounty MayoBob Geldofthe craicRTÉ Radio 1Irish Film InstituteLinenhall Arts CentreCastlebarEuropean Economic Communitypovertyemigrationsexual repressionenforced domestication of womenYouTubeA Month in the CountryStars and BarsThe January ManFools of FortuneCircle of FriendsInventing the AbbottsDancing at LughnasaSweet NovemberPrivate Peaceful