few films in 1999 have divided the critical consensus as sharply as alan parker's adaptation of frank mccourt's memoir angela's ashes . 
many dismissed it as an humorless , sentimentalized , uninteresting version of the hugely popular novel ; others hailed it as a heartfelt , sincere portrait of the human spirit . 
i'm somewhere in between , leaning strongly towards the latter . 
it's certainly well-made and it never becomes tedious like some literary adaptations have a tendency to be . 
but i have a feeling that parker filled the movie with pseudo-lyrical shots of rain falling on the homely streets of ireland just so it can have the two-and-a-half hour running time that screams " i'm important ! " 
mccourt's book of the same name was about him and his family moving from the us to ireland in the early 1900's , a time when most people were desperately trying to get into the us . 
as he comments , " we were the only irishfolk to say goodbye to the statue of liberty . " 
in ireland , frank ( played by joe breen as a small child ) , his 3 brothers , his mother angela ( emily watson ) and his father malachy ( robert carlyle ) get financial help from angela's mother , a stereotypically strict catholic who chides her daughter for marrying a northern irishman . 
she helps them get a rat-infested apartment and malachy goes looking for a job . 
positions are scarce and when he does finally find one , he is unable to hold on to it because of his fondness for drinking . 
meanwhile , frank goes to an uptight catholic school , where the instructors beat students with blunt wooden objects as often as their heart desires . 
two of frank's brothers soon die , crippled by the dreadful living conditions and malnutrition . 
as if the poverty and the suffering weren't intense enough as it stood , malachy and angela have another baby , worsening the situation further . 
i imagine this doesn't sound like much of a plot . 
that's probably because it isn't one . 
these are people . 
this is their story . 
director alan parker ( the commitments ) knows how to tell a good story and angela's ashes , despite its relentlessly literary tone remains interesting . 
though the film occasionally indulges too much in its gloomily picturesque irish setting , it avoids looking like a glorified travelogue . 
supplementing parker's able direction are the engaging , often poignant performances of the leads , some of them seasoned thespians , others relative beginners . 
carlyle , the charismatic british actor who has shown astonishing range by hopping from the lead in a rowdy slapstick comedy to the villain in a james bond movie and now to sentimental melodrama , perfectly portrays his rather pathetic character . 
we empathize with the guy , but we don't like or admire him . 
emily watson turns in a heartfelt , sincere supporting performance . 
it is mostly she who implants that lump in our throats . 
also worthy of mention is little joe breen , whose face graces the film's superb poster . 
it is breen's first feature film and he's extraordinary as young frank . 
not unlike sudden oscar darling haley joel osment of the sixth sense , you can peer into the character's soul through breen's sad eyes . 
on the flip side , one thing that could have vastly improved angela's ashes is a more decisive editor . 
while gerry hambling sure makes the most of the scenery , he and parker also leave in at least a half an hour of unnecessary footage . 
the first half , especially , could have been trimmed down , bringing the film to a more reasonable running time and doing our bladders a favor in the process . 
things pick up at about the halfway point , sort of dismissing a lot of the criticisms i accumulated during the opening hour , but i maintain that the aggressively deliberate pace parker and co . set in the first half was ludicrously unnecessary . 
 * spoiler warning ! 
skip next paragraph if in suspense ! * 
the film's final message is somewhat conflicted , as frankie , in effect , leaves his family famished in ireland while he himself goes back to america . 
what , exactly , are we supposed to make of that ? 
his mother doesn't seem to mind because she wants the best possible future for her son , as any mother would , but it still seems inconsiderate of him . 
i haven't read the book , but i'm sure that mccourt justifies his actions therein ; therefore , i'm suspicious . 
another thing that's never made clear in the movie is the meaning of the title , which , i'm sure , is also explained in the memoir . 
if seen as a film onto itself , rather than an adaptation , angela's ashes stands tall . 
despite a few minor setbacks , it is a captivating story of people forced to live in the trenches by an merciless society where those of weaker character are shoved to the bottom of the financial ladder .