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Belfast

Hope Meets Fear: 

Belfast (2021) and The Anxiety of Immigration

By Şeyda Taşkıner

Poster

The autobiographical movie Belfast (2021) brought Kenneth Branagh his first Academy Award in the category of Best Original Screenplay. The poignant movie presents a part of history set in the late 1960s Northern Ireland and the plot revolves around a working-class Ulster protestant family, from the perspective of a little child: Buddy. In the opening of the movie, the audience is introduced to the civil war started by Protestant gangsters in Belfast. The incident is historically accurate and known as ”The Troubles” in which fanatic Protestants slaughter Catholic families and burn their houses down in Ireland. Even though Buddy and his family are Protestants, they still feel in danger since they live in a location in which the outbreaks happen very often. The rate of unemployment rises in Ireland until it hits its peak and Buddy’s father works away from Belfast. Since he is in a lot of tax debt, the family has to migrate to another country in order to survive these brutal incidents.

The movie successfully portrays how thoughts of migration following a civil war may impact families and especially children. Buddy’s parents struggle to even explain the reasons why they have to migrate to their son because even though he is a nine-year-old child, he has a life and pursuits in Belfast, he has a very important school project to maintain and he has a girlfriend who happens to be an unfortunate Catholic. He has quite reasonable worries such as the possibility of his accent being mocked by another country’s citizens and even not being understood when he speaks to them. The character also touchingly reflects the possible fears of an immigrant; for instance, getting bullied, hated, and discriminated. Buddy’s mother also has similar worries to her son; she mentions that every household in Belfast is safe and known to them and she wants her husband to acknowledge that the people from the country where they migrate will not welcome them. Her main concerns about immigration are both the possibility of being hated in the country where they will continue to live and that of being estranged and unrecognizable to their own country, in other words, assimilated when they decide to come back. The family does not migrate to another country for the duration of the movie, they only struggle to make this hard decision about migrating and the director’s successful stressing on the theme of ”the uncertainty of the future” is quite impressive to the audience. Branagh brings light to the possible fears and anxieties regarding leaving one’s homeland through a well-written script that reflects the perspectives and thoughts of especially child and elder immigrants: In the end, Buddy’s grandmother prefers to stay in Belfast just because she recently lost her husband in this land and she does not want to leave his memory behind. The film makes the audience reflect emotionally on the predicament of the people who are obliged the leave their beloved homeland for a completely unknown place and an uncertain future following a crumb of hope.

Jude Hill as Buddy in Belfast (2021)