SWEETY BARRETT Official Competition

This gently affecting and beautifully directed first film is full of
surprises. Sweety Barrett is a big, strong, simple man. When the
film begins, he has lost his job at a circus and finds himself in a
mean-spirited, corrupt little port town whose chief industry is
smuggling “poteen,” the lethal potato whiskey of legend. Picked
up by Flick Hennessy, the area’s chief “exporter,” Sweety accepts a
job offer from the fatherly man. Soon he learns that the real boss
in town is Mannix Bone, the sadistic chief of police.
Sweety befriends a local woman, Anne, and especially hits it off
with her six-year-old son, Conor, who loves his new playmate.
Anne’s husband Leo is in prison, framed by Bone in order to force
him out of the poteen business and out of his partnership with
Flick.
But Leo is soon released and everything changes. It is soon after
this juncture that writer-director Stephen Bradley brilliantly and
utterly thwarts our expectations. The “twist” is a work of great
cinematic courage, its success is the mark of a vital new directorial
talent, and SWEElY BARRED, resolved richly and dramatically, is
one of the most impressive debut films in recent memory.-Noah
Cowan, Toronto Film Festival
Filmography:
SWEE1Y BARR ED is Stephen Bradley’s feature film debut
Print Source:
Temple Films