CHILD PUSHED PAST LIMIT IN `BUTCHER BOY'.

Byline: Bob Strauss Daily News Film Critic

They said that comic books and television would ruin the children. Of course, more stress than a young mind can handle may sometimes be a factor, too.

In ``The Butcher Boy,'' a charming Irish 12-year-old is driven to unspeakable acts by a combination of terrible tragedy and his own fevered, fantasy-fed imagination. It's the latest slice of subversion from Neil Jordan (``The Crying Game,'' ``Interview With the Vampire''), and quite possibly the best inside look at childhood psychosis ever filmed.

Think the brutal kids from ``Lord of the Flies'' or ``Hope and Glory's'' war-loving English schoolboys were nasty little buggers? They're nothing compared to Francie Brady (played by extraordinarily energetic newcomer Eamonn Owens). The delight of most residents of his picturesque Irish hamlet, Francie seems to have compensated for living with a mean-drunk father (``Crying Game's'' Stephen Rea) and mentally unbalanced mother (Aisling O'Sullivan) by becoming an entertaining friend to all.

Well, not all. He greatly dislikes the pretentious Anglophile next door, Mrs. Nugent (Fiona Shaw), mainly because she thinks he's a bad influence on her perfect little son. And Francie does possess quite a temper that rears up whenever someone fails to reciprocate his manic, often overbearing affection.

Still, you've got to admire the boy's generally sunny outlook, even as his mother, father, best friend and freedom are removed in a series of misfortunes Job would have had trouble tolerating.

As Francie's personal world grows darker, the light of the larger society appears to dim as well. It's the early 1960s, and visions of nuclear apocalypse play across Francie's brainscape as the Cuban missile crisis heats up. Molested by a priest at reform school, the lad starts having visions of the Blessed Virgin - and Sinead O'Connor plays her, so you know he's headed for big trouble.

Surreal and comic in a ghastly kind of way, ``Butcher Boy'' obviously has some things to say about small-town Irish hypocrisy that may be a wee too specific for American audiences to appreciate. Francie's elation, fear and capacity for devilry, however, transcend cultural barriers; even though they're so finely and peculiarly conceived that they play like vivid revelations, his attitudes are at least based on impulses we all felt as children.

Of course, most of us were equipped with the behavioral circuit-breakers that kept us from acting out like bloody-minded Francie. Disturbing enough on its own terms, ``Butcher Boy,'' which Jordan and Patrick McCabe adapted from McCabe's award-winning novel, should play in an especially resonant way in the wake of the Jonesboro, Ark., school killings. For those who can't comprehend why children commit violent acts, the movie provides insight, if not the ironclad answers we want.

The film is smart enough to acknowledge that some horrible things just have to remain a mystery.

THE FACTS

The film:``The Butcher Boy'' (R; violence, language, children in jeopardy).

The stars: Eamonn Owens, Stephen Rea, Fiona Shaw and Sinead O'Connor.

Behind the scenes: Directed by Neil Jordan. Written by Jordan and Patrick McCabe, based on McCabe's novel. Produced by Redmond Morris and Stephen Woolley. Released by Warner Bros.

Running time: One hour, 50 minutes.

Playing: Goldwyn Pavilion, West L.A.; Laemmle Sunset 5, West Hollywood; Mann Criterion, Santa Monica.

Our rating: Three and One Half Stars.

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Photo

Photo: Francie Brady (Eamonn Owens), left, endures torment from his father (Stephen Rea) in ``The Butcher Boy.''