Madam, - Whilst I enjoyed your arts correspondent Donald Clarke's report on the Galway Film Fleadh (July 16th), I thought it was unfair of him to criticise Sean Walsh's excellent new interpretation of James Joyce's Ulysses, Bl,.m, on the screen on the basis "of seeking to film the unfilmable". In fact your correspondent totally undermines his own argument by "supposing" in his conclusion that it has something to do with the "ineluctable modality of the visible". Precisely.
Of course Joyce's groundbreaking Protean use of language and imagery in Ulysses does not lend itself to the cinema. Nevertheless, Walsh's interpretation is totally in harmony with Joyce's own view that "laymen should be encouraged to think". Bl,.m is the only film that I've seen in a long time that does just that. And, it makes one of the greatest - albeit difficult - novels much more accessible to anyone prepared to make an effort to understand and enjoy it. If Walsh has achieved that alone - and this film achieves considerably more than that - I believe that the vast majority of Bl,.m viewers will agree that he thoroughly deserves our unreserved thanks.
Yours etc.
GERRY MOLONEY, Howth.