The Craic

Plot

It's 1988 and two best friends from Ireland (Jimeoin McKeown, Alan McKee) flee from Belfast after a violent confrontation with Colin (Robert Morgan) of the IRA and illegally enter Australia. The two fear immigration officers, and (after some gentle persuasion) Fergus Montague (McKeown) goes on a TV dating game show and wins a trip to Queensland in the process. This, however, occurs just as the pair's apartment is raided by immigration officer Derek Johnson [(Nicolas Bell)] and Wesley Murray (McKee) is forced to escape and eventually joins his friend in Queensland. Meanwhile, Colin is sent to Australia in a witness protection program after he gives up some of his former colleagues, and (much to the skepticism of his watchers, the SAS) names Fergus and Wesley as terrorists. Irritated by their lack of progress he eventually takes off to find them himself.

The two make their way up the coast and become acquainted with backpackers Alice [(Jane Hall)] and Erica [(played by Catherine Arena, Jimeoin's real life wife)] along the way. After their car overheats and explodes in the outback, the duo narrowly evade Colin, who has finally caught up with them. With the help of a local who calls himself Ron Barassi (Kyle Morrison) the duo make their way to a pub where immigration, the SAS, a police force who discovered their burnt-out car and Colin have all arrived at. As the duo are being carted away, Colin shoots out the windows of the police car and the duo escape once more, into the sunset. .

Critical reception

In a review in the long-running SBS Australian TV program, The Movie Show, cinema critic David Stratton described the film as an only intermittently funny road movie. Margaret Pomeranz agreed, finding the script underdeveloped, and the film itself "good-natured but really incredibly mundane".

Box office

The Craic grossed $5,265,935 at the box office in Australia.