Catholic News Service
Its title notwithstanding, night falls on 1950s Catholic Ireland in “Stella Days.” Director Thaddeus O’Sullivan’s adaptation of Michael Doorley’s memoir tells the story of a country in transition and one priest’s struggle to keep his flock and himself from spiritual exhaustion.
Antoine O. Flatharta’s script does not condemn the church and its role in Irish society outright, but marginalizes it, casting it as a relic of a rose-colored time in recent history. In this sense, “Stella Days” could be regarded as a cinematic stand-in for the real-life Irish church today, fighting to regain trust and to be recognized as relevant in the aftermath of traumatic scandals.