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An essay film which explores questions of national identity as constructed by critical views of Irish history on one hand, and the new formulations of national identity for Ireland in the interests of multinational capital on the other. The film works around an observation sequence at a business conference entitled "Facing Reality". The rhetoric of "Facing Reality" becomes a kind of allegory for forgetting.
As documentary, Trouble The Calm represents a successful example of a genre which gives documentary a life apart from television, or certainly Australian television. This "essay" film, like the best of its kind, has a personal voice. It was commissioned by Channel Four and despite the British broadcast ban on material on Northern Ireland, went to air in 1989.
- (JH)