Poet
The
- STORY -
The place is Limerick, Ireland. The time is 1922...
... a difficult time for Irish coal miners due to lay-offs and pay cuts resulting from intense European price wars. Poe: The Poet follows an ensemble of coal miners – Poe, Emrys, Hankins, and Casey – and Catherine, a newcomer in town, whose lives intertwine through a story of human drama, action, and extraordinary romance.
Poe: The Poet is a feast for those who love Ireland, its music, dance, and culture, and especially for admirers of the beauty and tragedy of timeless romance and drama in film.
Poe, a coal miner with dwarfism, is a poet, bibliophile, philosopher, and hopeless romantic.
After a chance meeting at their local church, he falls in love with Catherine, a sheltered young woman new to Limerick, who finds work at the local Rectory caring for mine orphans after the death of her mother. Catherine and Poe share in their love of books and culture; silently, he falls in love with her gentle spirit.
Catherine, however, is taken with Poe's dear friend and fellow miner Emrys, the hard-hitting, soccer-playing, married philanderer. In her desire to leave her sheltered past behind, she falls hard in love with Emrys and his rogueish nature and loses herself completely in their forbidden romance. Eventually, in trouble and alone after becoming pregnant with Emrys’ child, Catherine turns to Poe for help. Poe, tender by nature and unconditionally forgiving of the woman he loves from the sidelines, takes Catherine into his home and supports her through her pregnancy, even assisting in the delivery of her illegitimate child.
Amidst the coal wars, cultural mayhem, and their own relational fog,
the miners – unrefined, gutsy, and fun – survive by sticking together, playing poker, drinking hard, and fighting hard. They are darkly philosophical, blasphemous, bawdy, angry, and sad. Their story is one of stark survival and triumph of spirit.
Poe eventually makes the ultimate sacrifice for those he loves during a huge mine explosion, but his legacy changes the hearts of everyone whose lives he touched.
