The listing, Breakfast on Pluto (2005) DVD has ended.
Used: good condition, watched once
Both epic and intimate, Breakfast on Pluto uses the life of Patrick "Kitten" Braden (Cillian Murphy, Batman Begins), a queer orphan boy, to explore the hidden worlds that lie beneath so-called "normal" society--the subcultures of homosexuals, the Irish Republican Army, and prostitutes. At odds with his conservative Irish town, Patrick rebels with the fearlessness of someone whose life feels worthless. When he leaves for London, where he hopes to find his mother, he joins a touring rock band, is almost murdered, becomes assistant to a magician (Stephen Rea, The Crying Game), is arrested as an IRA terrorist, and joins a peep show--and those are only half of the markers on his odyssey (the movie struggles to encompass the novel by Patrick McCabe). Though the first half of the movie feel almost weightless in the headlong rush of events, a rich emotional heft sneaks up on you; by the end, Breakfast on Pluto has become almost unbearably sad and wonderfully buoyant. Murphy's superb performance is both delicate and willful, ably supported by an excellent cast, including Liam Neeson (Kinsey), Brendan Gleeson (Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire), and Ian Hart (Backbeat), as well as rock stars Gavin Friday and Bryan Ferry (who has a particularly creepy cameo as a serial killer). --Bret Fetzer