This Is My Father, a tale of family history in the old country, unfortunately has more in common with the latter group than the former, despite the fact that it's a drama. What these films share is the exploitation of Irish stereotypes to produce a shallow old-world ambiance. Drinking, dancing, piping, fighting, and repenting at mass the next day--this popular, cartoonish conception of Irish life is lovingly perpetuated by such movies.

For his first film, director Paul Quinn joins forces with his brothers Aidan (actor) and Declan (director of photography), a good start for a story of tangled family roots. James Caan plays a Chicago schoolteacher with an unresponsive elderly mother, a harried sister, and a rebellious teenage nephew. Prompted by a cryptic note on the back of a photograph, he takes his nephew to Ireland to discover the identity of his father, for whom he was named. An obliging Gypsy stereotype relates the tale: In the 1930s, a rich girl fell in love with an orphaned man (Quinn), thus scandalizing the town and leading to tragedy.

Wasting little time on its framing device, the movie flashes back to the past soon after Caan arrives in County Galway, and it returns to the present only for brief intermissions--a shame, given that Caan is by far the most interesting character in the film. Aidan Quinn doesn't help matters by playing aggressively against type, suppressing all his natural charm in favor of shuffles, stooped shoulders, and breathy mumbling.

Worse, the flashback story substitutes atmosphere for incident, reducing the past to picturesque locations shot with blue filters. By contrast, the present-day story has been trimmed to almost nothing. Apart from a visit to his father's grave, Caan barely gets to react to what he's learned, and the rebellious nephew is apparently tamed by two flirtatious Catholic schoolgirls.