You won't see anything better on RTE this year than Hidden History: The Catalpa Rescue. The story of how six British soldiers convicted of membership of the Fenians were rescued from Fremantle Prison in 1876 by an international conspiracy of their American, Australian and Irish comrades was of a complexity and tension that age had not withered one bit. It was superb and the inclusion of the Aussie novelist Thomas Keneally to give the background colour supplied the Schindler star quality.Now I'm even more annoyed that I missed it and I can't find any place to catch it.
Lynch also had this to say about the rescue itself:
Only one question remains. Where, in the name of a dingo's daggy didgeridoo, is Hollywood?I can remember when I finished O'Luing's book and returned it to the man who had loaned it to me he asked me what I thought. I said "it's an amazing story and it would make a great movie. I can't believe Hollywood hasn't taken this book and turned it into a winning film script".
By the way, it's not hard to find O'Luing's book in the library in Ireland, but for some reason it's always listed as a "children's book". I don't know why that is, but I think it's because O'Luing wrote the book for secondary school students during the 1960s. Whatever the reason, it is definitely not a childish book.
