Herself

It's a very engaging movie. It shows what can happen if people don't just judge.

Outstanding performances keep "Herself" from being just another formulaic movie about a mother trying to establish a home for her and her children after leaving an abusive lowlife husband. Claire Dunne is especially impressive as the abused wife who had the strength to leave. The girls who play her daughters were also great, seemingly actual sisters in real life by their interaction and natural chemistry with one another. 3 stars

Astonishingly good. Terrific acting by Clare Dunne, the abused single mom, as well as by the very young girls playing her two daughters. The story unfolds with so much hope and determination with a believable but tragic finale. I highly recommend this one!

What an amazing film...just brilliant 👏 👌 😀 👍

A nice story about the journey of a mother and the various battles she has to fight for her kids. I personally felt it started off slowly but the more it progressed, the more satisfying it felt.

A very powerful display of resilience.

This film is good because it distance itself from the typical Irish ending movie. It's tragic, sad but unexpected which saves this film from an average film to a good one.

I have to admit that I'm a sucker for 'small movies'. No explosions, no villains. no hunky men or sultry women. This movie is simple, straightforward in its message: we all struggle just to get by in a world that can be unforgiving and heartless and yet heroes do appear when least expected

It takes a lot for me to like feel-good, inspirational, people-pleasing movies. It might have to do with me, but often, I find such movies overly simple, cheesy, sappy, and/or too inoffensive. But, I saw the decent scores and saw the trailer and decided it should be one of the many movies I see in a year. And... I liked it. Most of the acting is good. I really didn't find anyone in it that I felt did a bad performance. However, I felt the stand outs were Clare Dunne as our leading lady and even the child actresses playing her children (Molly McCann and Ruby Rose O'Hara). Often times, child actors can be a hit or miss and more often than not, they are just there to be cute in these types of films. I was pleasantly surprised with the young actresses. Hell, one of the moments that struck me on a personal note was the youngest daughter not wanting to visit her father when he had visiting rights. While the film makes it out to be a twist, it was very obvious to me that the youngest daughter witness her father brutally beat her mother. Haunted by that horror, she's too scared to visit her father, even though he honestly might not harm her, as abusive to his wife as he is. While my situation was not like the little girl's, let's just say something similar enough to it happened that made me feel for this girl in a way that reminded me of myself. I never thought this film would strike me in such a way. I enjoyed the aspect of our main character building a home and rebuilding her life. The soundtrack using popular music for these building montages could have been very sappy, but it never annoyed me the way other films have done. I also liked that this film was willing to go to dark places and ballsy enough to have an ending I didn't see coming. I can see people being pissed off by the ending. It really does have the clichés and tropes of inoffensive, crowd-pleasing, feel-good films, but it never felt as bad as the generic ones that are often too happy and simplistic for my taste. Honestly, Herself is more deserving of 3 stars as it is a film I liked, but was never really in love with it. It is simply the good version of a feel-good movie. However, because there was a few things that impressed me more than the average film of its genre, I'm willing to bump my rating up to 3.5.

Herself is a restrained, intelligent and highly impactful drama about domestic violence, perseverance and community. It has a certain grace about it, a definite care involved for all the characters. Clare Dunne is truly wonderful as Sandra, a mother of two young girls in Ireland. She is the victim of repeated domestic abuse. Finally she escapes and finds temporary accomodation whilst trying to restablish a new life. She takes odd jobs to survive. One is caring for an elderly doctor who has suffered a broken hip. When the doctor, Peggy, offers Clare part of her land to build a house on she takes it up as a way to start over again. Through perseverance she manages to enlist help from the local community to build the house. It's a great story of inner strength and the bonds of friendship, whilst shining an important light on the plague of domestic violence. The film has a natural grace with strong characters throgh out. As mentioned Dunne, who also co wrote the script, is wonderful. As is the great Harriet Walter as Peggy. A film of many qualities, a film of humour and resolve.