Kilkenny filmmaker explores the local impact of Civil War executions

A new short film Dear Mother, written and directed by Wallslough film-maker Kevin Hughes which debuted recently at the Butler Gallery is a vivid and sensitive look at how war impacts our humanity. 

The film set during the Irish Civil war in 1922,  tells the tragic true story of John Murphy and John Phelan who were both executed on December 29, 1922 in Stephens Barracks, Kilkenny. The 100th anniversary of their deaths falls this year and the film, shot on what Kevin refers to as a ‘super-micro budget’ is part of Kilkenny County Council’s Decade of Centenaries Programme 2022, supported by the Commemorations Unit of the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sports and Media.

At 24 minutes long, the film is brief yet manages to skillfully explore the relationship between one of the condemned men John Murphy and his prison guard Tom, as just before John’s impending execution they begin to establish a tenuous relationship. 

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Kevin started the project by looking for ‘ a little gem of an idea’ explaining ‘I didn’t want to tell political stories, I just wanted to tell human stories’.

An initial search about Kilkenny and the Civil War turned up the letter from John Murphy to his mother written on the eve of his execution. Kevin then met Larry Scallan of Kilkenny Military Heritage Tours, at Stephens Barracks in Kilkenny who knew about the missive. 

Kevin explains: “When I met him, we went in and looked at the cells and talked about the story and fleshed it out a bit. Even though the events of the story are created in the film, I invented parts like the soldier - he symbolises all Irish people that wouldn’t be supportive of someone getting shot although he’s caught in an impossible situation himself, I wanted to bring more humanity to the actual events.”

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He reflects: “The Irish Civil War is a dark stain on our history and it is important that stories like this are told and reach as large an audience as possible to raise awareness of some of the tragic and at times horrific events that took place during the war.”

What comes across starkly through the words of the film’s letter are John Murphy’s acceptance and resignation to his fate combined with his deeply held faith in God. It is the simple sincere language of the letter that inspired Kevin Hughes to make Dear Mother.

Kevin expands: “There were elements that I found intriguing: the simplicity of the language, the lack of emotion, actually it felt like a very clear thinking mind. If you look at the letter ..  there’s no mistakes in it. They didn’t go back and correct anything.

“He was very sure of his religious faith - he was very sure of his cause, that he was on the right side of history in his mind. He was dying for a noble cause.”

He continues: “There’s a line in it that inspired a lot of the film ‘It’s getting dark’. He was obviously writing the letter in the evening and I took that line and I ran with that as a way to carry the idea that light and darkness, and death and life were something to play with.” 

What is particularly striking is that the voice of John Murphy echoes so clearly across a century. Kevin observes, “You can leave traces of yourself if you express yourself. If people are honest in their writing it resonates through time.” 

At its heart, this is a film about humans’ basic empathy for each other. No matter what the ideology and differences between people, that common understanding of what life is, connects us. Kevin says that for his characters, "Life was a shared language, a shared  experience," despite their political ideologies. For Kevin, Dear Mother aims to illustrate that “The taking of a life is a profound thing.”

Some of the film was shot in the very location where the two men were imprisoned and the exact yard where the executions took place. This adds a poignant authenticity to the film and shooting there had a profound effect on the cast and crew.

Kevin recalls: “A big part of the film was the location, actually shooting in the barracks. It was spooky  - it was very emotional. We felt we had to be incredibly respectful to the people that had walked those corridors.”

Many of the cast and crew of Dear Mother are local: John Rice (the  Free State soldier) is from the Pococke Road and currently studying drama in London, another lead Brendan Corcoran (the Free State officer) is from Ballycallan, the cameraman Brendan Comerford is from Kilkenny while Georgina Brennan-Styne playing the mother is from Carlow. The excellent Éanna Grogan who portrays John Murphy with great sensitivity is from Clonmel.

Kevin believes there is an abundance of amazing untapped talent in regions like Kilkenny  who are seeking projects to exercise and develop their creative skills.

Kevin himself  is an award winning filmmaker with over 40 professional film credits. He has worked on projects ranging from major documentaries and feature films to short dramas. He has travelled around the world as a documentary filmmaker, literally from Everest to the forests of Cuba but is now working from his home place of Kilkenny. 

During the pandemic last year he made another drama set in 1921 at the height of the War of Independence called The Reburial Of Jackie Brett which featured in a number of international film festivals.

Next year Kevin hopes to shoot a horror film, The Glass Girl. He says, “There’s a lot of variables between now and the first day of shooting. I want to do a feature next. I’ve worked on features, I’ve edited features but to actually conceive and execute a feature film or hold it up is quite a difficult thing to do. It’s the ultimate challenge for a film-maker.” 

Dear Mother will be shown at the Concert Hall Thomastown on Friday December 2, at 8pm to commemorate both John Murphy and John Phelan who are buried in Thomastown’s old graveyard. A local historian Joe Doyle will introduce the film and give a talk about the executions.