Troubled Epic

Ryan's Daughter won two Oscars. This book, focusing on the locations and interviewing local people involved, describes the troubled shooting of the film, on and off camera, and how its stars - Robert Mitchum, Sarah Miles, Trevor Howard, Christopher Jones and John Mills - coped with a year on Ireland's south-west coast in the 1960s.

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Although the road collapse at Slea Head on the Dingle Peninsula means some tourists may have to adapt their holiday plans, there is still so much to see in the beautiful south-west of Ireland. In fact, it was Ryan's Daughter, winner of two Oscars, that first lured Michael Tanner to the Dingle Peninsula. Chosen by the film's director and script-writer over locations in India, Sicily and Sardinia, the Dingle Peninsula's sweeping landscape and magnificent beaches were ideal for the epic love story. Michael researched this story by focusing on identifying locations and interviewing local people involved in the film's shoot. The result is an unvarnished account of the troubled shooting of the film, both on and off camera, and how its stars - Robert Mitchum, Sarah Miles, Trevor Howard, Christopher Jones and John Mills - coped with a year on Ireland's west coast in 1969. The story is largely told in the words of local people who were drivers, extras, prop men, landladies, actors or mere observers.
Packed with pictures and archive material, much never published before, this is the behind-the-scenes story of a film which changed the Dingle Peninsula overnight, saw more antics than usual by stars off and on set, and resulted in David Lean making no film for 14 years, so fraught was the experience.