The 1988 movie Pierce Brosnan can’t believe became a cult classic: “Who would’ve guessed?”
Right now, we’re slap bang in the midst of the third iteration of Pierce Brosnan, and all told, it might well be the best phase of his career so far.
First, there was the silky smooth, all-American (even though he’s Irish) Remington Steele, early 1980s Pierce, all coiffured hair and soft focus and perfect skin. Then there was James Bond Pierce in the 1990s, sharp suits, gadgets, measured authority and The Thomas Crown Affair, which was basically just Bond with some paintings and Rene Russo.
And now for the last couple of decades, we’ve had silver-fox Pierce, like the sexiest granddad who ever lived, going from melting housewife hearts in Mamma Mia! to breaking legs in stuff like Guy Ritchie’s MobLand and as the ultra-stylish secret agency head in Steven Soderbergh’s Black Bag.
You can take your pick of which version of Brosnan you like the best, but you can’t deny the man has staying power. 40 years on the big screen and he’s as magnetic as ever, with well over 100 films under his (no doubt expensive and real leather) belt, he is a proper movie star and no doubt will continue to be until he calls it a day.
Between the headline acts, the Bond films and the ABBA tributes, Brosnan has done some genuinely interesting stuff that occasionally flies under the radar. Just this year, there was the Prince Naseem Hamed biopic Giant, in which he played the late great trainer Brendan Ingle. There was his quiet, composed performance in 2023’s The Last Rifleman as a WWII veteran summoning up the courage to visit France for the D-Day landings anniversary.
And in 1988, before he got the call from MI6 and Goldeneye, Brosnan was cast in a low-budget thriller called Taffin, about a debt collector in a small Irish town who beats people up with martial arts in order to get money out of them. Based on a book by Lyndon Mallet, there were some problems initially because the main character was supposed to be overweight and unattractive, neither of which are labels that could be applied to Brosnan.
Despite plenty of action, it was not a movie that did well with critics, or audiences for that matter, failing to break £200k at the box office. But in the years, since it has become something of a cult classic, mainly thanks to Brosnan’s performance, and especially thanks to one moment where he, in his role as the titular character, shouts, and I mean really shouts, at his co-star on a sofa.
Brosnan told the NME, “Yeah, I’ve heard it’s become a cult film. I made it in Ireland many moons ago with the lovely, beautiful Alison Doody. And Francis Megahy, who has now left us, directed it. There’s some line in it that I shout out. I can’t remember what the line is, but it’s just crazy, isn’t it? That’s the glory of still being at the table and doing what I love. So yes, Taffin lives on. Who would’ve guessed?”
The line he can’t recall is, “Well then, maybe you shouldn’t be living here”, but you’ll have to watch the video below to truly understand why it has taken on such prominence. It may not be a masterpiece of understated acting, but you’ll enjoy it nonetheless.
