His brilliant mind, trapped inside his imperfect body, would have gone mad from calling for help.Ĭhristy is played in the early scenes by Hugh O'Conor and from his teenage years onward by Daniel Day-Lewis. His father goes into the local pub to have a pint and consider the fact that his son has been born handicapped, and then he stubbornly makes the statement that no son of his will be sent to a "home." The decision to raise Christy as part of a large and loving family is probably what saved his life, for a man of such intelligence would have been destroyed by an institution. "My Left Foot" charts Christy's life from his earliest days until his greatest triumph, but the key scene in the movie may be one that takes place shortly after he is born. And as the movie develops, it is startling how much of it plays as comedy - startling, unless we remember the universal Irish trait of black humor, in which the best laughter, the wicked laughter, is born out of hard times and bad luck. We know that it is all right to laugh with Christy, and not to be intimidated by the great burden of his life. "I only asked for a f - light." It is the perfect opening scene, because it breaks the ice. Brown," she says, "you know that smoking is not good for you." "I didn't ask for a f - psychological lecture," he replies. Trying to get her out of the way for a second, he asks her for a light for his cigarette. But a hired nurse is watching him with a gimlet eye. He has a pint of whiskey hidden in his jacket pocket, with a straw to allow him to sip it. He is backstage in the library of a great British country home where he is soon to be brought out to be given an award. Perhaps concerned that we will mistake "My Left Foot" for one of those pious TV docudramas, the movie begins in the middle of one of Christy's typical manipulations. Like many geniuses, he was not an easy man to live with, and the movie makes that clear in its brilliant opening scene. Tiny and twisted, bearded and unkempt, he managed, despite his late start, to grow into a poet, a novelist, a painter and a lyrical chronicler of his own life.
Jim Sheridan's "My Left Foot" is the story of Christy's life, based on his autobiography and on the memories of those who knew him.
He belongs on the same list with Helen Keller, and yet it is hard to imagine Christy being good company for the saintly Miss Keller, since he was not a saint himself but a ribald, boozing, wickedly gifted Irishman who simply happened to be handicapped. The story of Christy Brown is one of the great stories of human courage and determination.
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