Themes: Interracial/Cross-Cultural Romance, Love Triangles, Twentysomething Life
Main Cast: Cillian Murphy, Paloma Baeza, Barry Ward, Michael Liebman, Ingeborga Dapkunaite
Release Year: 1999
Country: IE/US
Run Time: 86 minutes
Plot
A group of Irish college students are about to leave for the United States, where they've landed summer jobs in Long Island, when a slightly shady friend of one of the gang, Davin (Cillian Murphy), decides to tag along as a quick way out of a doomed romance. While the students all have jobs and working papers lined up, Davin is an illegal alien in the States. But he leads a charmed life, and manages to get by quite nicely, even finding an American sweetheart, a cab dispatcher named Aideen (Paloma Baeza). Robert (Barry Ward), meanwhile, gets more from his job than he expected when he serves as a houseboy for a well-to-do artist named Carolyn (Ingeborga Dapkunaite). The rest of the group works hard in the day and plays even harder at night, as they relish the opportunity to enjoy adult life far from the eyes of their families. Sunburn marked the feature debut for director Nelson Hume; it was produced by Jean Doumanian, who produced a number of films for Woody Allen and briefly produced the TV series Saturday Night Live. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide
Review
S Club 7 be damned -- those seeking an antidote to nubile-European-teens-on-holiday flicks need look no further than Nelson Hume's debut film, which scruffily charts the coming-of-age of about a dozen young Irishmen and women abroad. Sunburn may not be in the same league as such summer-job gems as Experience Preferred...But Not Essential, but it has a natural, unforced feel that overrides its at-times clichéd narrative. The natural cast -- led by the standout Cillian Murphy -- drinks, smokes, and lazes away their time in America with a pleasantly unpretentious air: Hume doesn't presume that their experience is the stuff of revelatory, life-altering drama, nor does he resort to lame, culture-clash one-liners. Shot with a gritty, sun-dappled flair by Frank De Marco and scored by the irrepressibly buoyant High Llamas, Sunburn is the rarest of teen trifles: one whose irrepressible atmosphere and personality linger long after its inconsequential plot has faded. ~ Michael Hastings, All Movie Guide
Laura Roberts - Art Director, Gillian Reynolds - Casting, Susan Fried - Casting, Thomas J. Mangan IV - Co-producer, Alicia Sams - Co-producer, Nelson Hume - Director, Suzanne Pillsbury - Editor, Letty Aronson - Executive Producer, J.E. Beaucaire - Executive Producer, John Logigian - Executive Producer, Kenny Vance - Musical Direction/Supervision, Ken Weiss - Musical Direction/Supervision, High Llamas - Songwriter, Mark White - Production Designer, Frank G. de Marco - Cinematographer, Jean Doumanian - Producer, William Kozy - Sound/Sound Designer, Nelson Hume - Screenwriter, Mark Edgington - Screenwriter
