Noth­ing Com­pares – first-look review

For any­one with a pass­ing knowl­edge of O’Connor’s work and what has influ­enced it – name­ly, the shock­ing abuse suf­fered at the hands of her moth­er and the Catholic Church’s role in that abuse – Kathryn Ferguson’s affect­ing debut may well feel familiar.

Book­end­ed by an infa­mous appear­ance at a Bob Dylan trib­ute con­cert in New York in 1992, where O’Connor was booed and heck­led – hav­ing ripped the Catholic Church to shreds on live TV just days ear­li­er – Ferguson’s film wise­ly focus­es on the singer’s for­ma­tive jour­ney and rise to fame, before it all came crash­ing down.

Aid­ed by a series of mon­tages fea­tur­ing home movies and oth­er his­tor­i­cal footage, we see O’Connor escap­ing the suf­fo­cat­ing clutch­es of the Church in Ire­land – where women are con­sti­tu­tion­al­ly bound to remain at home – for a bet­ter, more lib­er­at­ing life in London’s Not­ting Hill. Bas­ing her­self between the Ras­ta and Irish com­mu­ni­ties, her vis­cer­al song­writ­ing – and that remark­able voice – quick­ly lead to major label inter­est. By the time she’s 21, O’Connor is per­form­ing in front of Ste­vie Won­der at the Gram­mys and is on the front pages of the glob­al music press.

Her appear­ances on prime­time tele­vi­sion at home – where she puts up with a painful­ly patro­n­is­ing line of ques­tion­ing – only reaf­firms to her (and us) why she must leave the archa­ic, god-fear­ing life in Ire­land behind her. As we are remind­ed lat­er, abor­tion is only legal­ized in 2015, almost 30 years after her label try (unsuc­cess­ful­ly) to force her to abort her own child for the sake of their cash investment.

Through­out, O’Connor res­olute­ly remains true to her­self, often in chal­leng­ing cir­cum­stances, and at such a young age. She refus­es to become the pack­aged pop singer her label wants. Her response: to shave her head. She scraps her debut album and recuts it from scratch. As her star burns ever brighter, and that infa­mous Prince cov­er becomes a mega glob­al hit, she becomes more out­spo­ken about the hypocrisy at home and ugly rev­e­la­tions about a pope and an insti­tu­tion that turns a blind eye to sys­tem­at­ic abuse.

Which, of course, leads on to that incen­di­ary moment on Sat­ur­day Night Live when, unbe­known to any­one but her­self, she launch­es into a sear­ing ver­sion of Bob Marley’s War before, lit­er­al­ly, tear­ing the Pope to pieces before our very eyes. As Peach­es, one of sev­er­al fig­ures inter­viewed in the film attests, the moment is pure per­for­mance art. Breath­tak­ing in its fear­less­ness and sense of pur­pose, we dis­cov­er it has been pre-planned: the papal pho­to, one of only two items tak­en by O’Connor from her late mother’s house, sym­bol­izes her abuse and the régime that con­dones it. It remains one of the most exhil­a­rat­ing moments of live music television.

America’s pre­dictable response – shock and out­rage at such ​‘heresy’ – ensures the super­star is soon banned by radio, black­list­ed by pro­mot­ers and trashed by the media. With nowhere to go but home, she retreats, for 10 long years, allow­ing, unfor­tu­nate­ly, for the hoopla to all but con­sume her. A sooth­ing coda cum requiem brings us up to date.

There are pow­er­ful moments through­out this like­able and very watch­able film: from the care­ful­ly recon­struct­ed scenes of her tor­ment­ed youth – where her moth­er is bare­ly seen but always felt – to the moment her music teacher dis­cov­ers her tal­ent and coax­es her to per­form. Her for­mer man­ag­er, pub­li­cist, band mem­bers and first hus­band, music pro­duc­er John Reynolds, add to the can­dour. Which then abrupt­ly ends as we zip rather too quick­ly through her third act and up to the present day.

Sur­pris­ing­ly, the ​‘lost decade’ isn’t explored beyond a cur­so­ry note. We could have done, too, with a more round­ed pic­ture of her influ­ence on today’s artists. And, of course, the hor­ror of her son’s sui­cide – and her own fragili­ty because of it – is far too recent to be able to fea­ture here. Tonal­ly, though, Ferguson’s film feels intu­itive: frank and fierce when it needs to be, and melod­ic and empa­thet­ic through­out. Which for a trail­blaz­er and sur­vivor like O’Connor is exact­ly what one would hope for. An enrich­ing experience.