Figure 1.-- Ralph near the finish of the Boston Marathon of 1954. He doesn't win, but he does manage to come in second, so the race is both a victory (because his mother does awaken from her coma) and a defeat (because he can't be first as he had hoped). Triumph and disappointment are nicely mingled at the end.

"Saint Ralph" is the coming-of-age story of Ralph Walker, a devout but somewhat wayward and mischievous boy at a rather strict Catholic boarding school in Hamilton. Ralph's father has been killed in World War II, and the boy has grown up with only the memory of his Dad, cherishing his father's military uniform. His mother is very ill in a local hospital and falls into a coma from which, Ralph believes, only a miracle will awaken her. There are two important scenes which take place in the school refectory. There is an incident at the swimming pool and Ralph is in a lot of trouble over this. He is not liked because the pool had to closed and no one can swim there until it is cleaned. This incident turns the school against him. All the school jeered at Ralph and called him when he enteres the refectory. Ralph is constantly getting in trouble with the rigid disciplinarian headmaster, Father Fitzpatrick, who punishes Ralph (he has no particular interest in athletics) by making him join the school track team and work out with the boy runners. The track coach, Father George Hibbert, gets him interested in running and at one point makes a joke about how the boys on his team are hardly material for the Boston Marathon. He says it would be "a miracle" if anyone from the school won that race. But Ralph, with a kind of absurd idealism, decides to train for the Boston Marathon and enter the race in the hope that he can provide the miracle his mother needs. With a kind of literal-mindedness the fourteen-year-old Ralph connects the miracle of winning the race with the miracle of his mother's recovery from the coma. Most of the film concerns Ralph's determined campaign to get himself in shape for the Boston race with the support of Father Hibbert, his sympathetic coach. Training for the race becomes a metaphor in the film for Ralph's spiritual growth and transition into the realities of adulthood. As such it is both funny and moving by turns and provides a delightful melding of comedy and pathos without ever becoming either crude or sappy and sentimental. After the Boston Marathon Ralph again enteres the refectory and this time he is cheered and given much respect by all his peers. In a sense a miricle had happened in that he had gone from the pupil everyone disliked to a well respected and honoured pupil because of his determination to run in a race none but the best competed in. No-one expected him to win and thought he was foolish to try but achieved despite all the odds being him.

Created: 6:37 AM 1/13/2006
Last updated: 6:37 AM 1/13/2006