Though Boorman remains most famous for early films like Deliverance,
The General is one of his warmest and most affecting works, and won him
Best Director at Cannes. It charts the rise and fall of Dublin crook
Martin Cahill (Gleeson), whose gang tweaked the noses of the police and
IRA alike. Gleeson is extraordinarily charismatic as he shambles
about, shielding his eyes from the world, remembering the days when he
ran through the alleys, flicking V-signs at his pursuers. But - as in
Deliverance - it's Voigt who provides moral centre, as the cop who knows
Cahill best.
