Upcoming Movie About Ireland to US Adoption Trafficking UPDATED

I covered Ireland’s trafficking for adoption in August 2012. See the post here. This month I will be giving a summary of the book Banished Babies.

Dame Judi Dench is starring in a new movie about this topic.

“Dame Judi Dench has signed on to play in the true  life story of Philomena Lee, a heartbroken Irish mother whose search for her  long lost son she gave up for adoption ended up at his grave.

The film will be directed by Stephen Frears.

Due to be shot in Ireland, Dench will play the role  of Lee, an Irish unmarried woman who was forced to give her baby up for adoption  after being committed to a Catholic institution in the 1950s.

The son, whose adoptive name was Michael Hess, was  secretly sold by nuns in Tipperary to a wealthy  American couple. He rose to become chief legal counsel to President George Bush  Senior. Hess was secretly gay and later died of AIDS. He made several efforts  to contact his mother. However, the nuns in Roscrea in Tipperary rebuffed him, but in return for a large donation he was allowed to buy a  burial plot in the convent cemetery. He left a message to his mother on his  gravestone hoping she would find him. He never knew his birth mother was  searching for him until she finally tracked him down.

The film is based on a book by Martin Sixsmith, a  former BBC TV foreign  correspondent and government communications director.

Lee met Sixsmith in 2004 and the two embarked on a  story to find her long lost son, who she was unaware had been adopted by  American parents.

Steve Coogan, who will portray the role of Sixsmith,  told IFTN: “The film is a comic tragedy or a tragic comedy. It’s  about two very different people, at different stages of their lives, who help  each other and show that there is laughter even in the darkest places.”

Stephen Frears will direct the movie adaption which  is due to be shot in on location in London, Ireland, and Washington DC. Filming  is expected to begin in Ireland next month.”

Dame Judi Dench to star in true-life movie based on Irish unmarried mother

[Irish Central 8/3/12 by Dara Kelly]

REFORM Puzzle Pieces

 Update: The movie has been made. See our post here