The Boondock Saints (1999) is a cult film about two Irish brothers in Boston who, in response to rampant organized crime, turn to vigilantism and become saints in the eyes of the townfolk. The film has come under attack for portraying the vigilantism of the brothers as a heroic attribute, but is generally understood to leave the ethical question surrounding their behaviour for the viewer to decide. The credits sequence shows a collection of (staged) interviews with people on the city streets about their views of The Saints behaviour with opinion roughly split between hero worship and critisism.
The film was never released in theaters due to the events at Columbine High School. The director of the film, Troy Duffy, funded screenings of the film with help from Blockbuster Video. Despite great receptions at screenings worldwide, the film was still not bought for theatrical release. Blockbuster released The Boondock Saints as a "Blockbuster Exclusive", a collection of independent, straight-to-video films. Rumors among fans of the movie state that video clerks would intentionally place The Boondock Saints in the case of a more popular film in order to promote awareness of the film. Whether this is true or not, The Boondock Saints gained a large following due entirely to word of mouth publicity, and was a top seller when released on DVD.
Its cast includes Sean Patrick Flanery and Norman Reedus as Connor and Murphy McManus; Willem Dafoe as the gay and homophobic FBI agent Paul Smecker, David Della Rocco as David Della Rocco, Billy Connolly as an assassin known as Il Duce and Ron Jeremy as an Italian mobster.
A followup is in the works according to IMDB (http://www.imdb.com) Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day (IMDB link) (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0330083/) which follows on from the courtroom scene at the end of the first film.