Critic Reviews

One of the better films concerning the tensions in Northern Ireland, THE OUTSIDER stars Craig Wasson as a young Irish-American inspired by his grandfather's patriotic tales of fighting the British years ago.

The Outsider is vivid even if it isn't much of a character study, and energetic even though it's often clumsy.

The Outsider represents the first attempt to get behind the incessant headlines and into the minds and motives at work on one of the longest-fought terrorist campaigns of the times - through an intelligent fictional story with an Irish setting.

More confusing than illuminating, it's a film which will rely more on its reputation than its achievement.

The "troubles" in Northern Ireland would seem to be an excellent dramatic vehicle: tension, violence, a people torn apart by religious, political, and economic differences. But writer-director Tony Luraschi turns it into a polemic. Speeches replace action and the dialogue is wooden. [14 Feb 2014, p.G31]