The Banshees of Inisherin

Interrupting Christmas Eve drinking solely cos this is incredible and deserves a thread. The scenery, the portrayals of rural life and loneliness, the dialogue. I loved it and I have many thoughts but I will try and think of something more to say because I loved this a lot.

Cool. Saw the trailer and didn’t quite know what to make of it.

Discussed earlier on the In Bruges thread I think

i watched this earlier this week actually and was surprised there hadn't been a thread on it.

i liked it although i wouldn't say it fully landed with me immediately upon viewing. some good lines and a to-be-expected great performance by farrell, sure, but i was having trouble figuring out the point of it all--imo it's not really much about friendship contrary to what i had been led to believe. i'll do a spoiler for the rest of this i guess:

the reading that i heard after the fact that worked for me was the idea that colm and padraic are representing two conflicting impulses in one person, specifically a creative/artistic person. that made a lot of sense to me and better explained the mutually assured destruction ending as sort of a pessimistic take on being able to find a balance between being out in the world having relationships vs. creating some sort of lasting work

I thought this movie fucking sucked. Such a weird juxtaposition of comedy with relentlessly dark subject matter and completely superficial characters. The only reason this movie is getting any attention whatsoever is that someone errantly judged it as being profound and everyone hopped on the bandwagon.

I don't think it's "profound," but I liked it. Mostly for Farrell's performance and for the pervasive sense of isolation and smallness — of the island, its social circles and the mindsets and worldviews of the residents. The sister is the most sympathetic character by some distance, and I was glad she at least got the hell out.

Come Anticipate Martin McDonagh's 'In Bruges'

Banshees is fantastic. I can never remember which McDonagh brother is which, but this is a lot like John Michael's Calvary. The small island grudges thing reminded me of Michael Powell's Edge Of The World too.

― Robert Adam Gilmour, Saturday, October 22, 2022 8:22 PM (two months ago) bookmarkflaglink

I haven't liked a movie this guy's done but I do want to see Colin Farrell get an Oscar so ...

― Eric H., Saturday, October 22, 2022 9:27 PM (two months ago) bookmarkflaglink

― 𝔠𝔞𝔢𝔨 (caek), Saturday, October 22, 2022 9:33 PM (two months ago) bookmarkflaglink

I liked Calvary, so that's good news to me

― feed me with your chips (zchyrs), Saturday, October 22, 2022 9:46 PM (two months ago) bookmarkflaglink

First half was a great movie about how difficult it is for men to maintain long term friendships but then it gets progressively more daft for the sake of some high drama

― Saxophone Of Futility (Michael B), Saturday, October 22, 2022 9:58 PM (two months ago) bookmarkflaglink

Has this been released everywhere yet? It's one of my favorites this year.

― Robert Adam Gilmour, Saturday, October 29, 2022 8:29 PM (one month ago) bookmarkflaglink

Gonna watch a preview on Wednesday.

― Malevolent Arugula (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, October 29, 2022 8:35 PM (one month ago) bookmarkflaglink

Saw it the other night. Pretty good I thought but I did how many people attending where thinking more 'quirky Irish comedy' than 'Martin McDonagh film'

― Ned Raggett, Saturday, October 29, 2022 8:43 PM (one month ago) bookmarkflaglink

I accept this film as a microcosm of social conflict and dysfunction during the Irish Civil War--without the English as a common enemy the Irish start attacking each other. But dang was that slog to sit through.

― Infanta Terrible (j.lu), Saturday, November 5, 2022 12:00 PM (one month ago) bookmarkflaglink

It was waaaay too nice.

― Malevolent Arugula (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, November 5, 2022 12:16 PM (one month ago) bookmarkflaglink

three weeks pass...
I liked Banshees, the first time McDonagh has made me think of Beckett (or think of him in terms of Beckett, anyway). Colin Farrell really is good, would be happy for him to get some awards out of it.

― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Saturday, November 26, 2022 1:21 AM (four weeks ago) bookmarkflaglink

the farrell performance is so excellent

i never quite fell for the film but i understand why others have

― flamenco drop (BradNelson), Saturday, November 26, 2022 1:28 AM (four weeks ago) bookmarkflaglink

same

― Malevolent Arugula (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Saturday, November 26, 2022 1:32 AM (four weeks ago) bookmarkflaglink

I liked that the movie resisted easy resolutions — part of its point I guess. But for sure Farrell is the main reason to see it. Everyone else is good too, it’s a strong cast.

― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Saturday, November 26, 2022 2:45 AM (four weeks ago) bookmarkflaglink

The funniest thing for me was hearing people express how boring they found some other people.

― Robert Adam Gilmour, Saturday, November 26, 2022 7:33 PM (four weeks ago) bookmarkflaglink

I thought it was great, want a mini donkey

― akm, Sunday, November 27, 2022 3:35 AM (four weeks ago) bookmarkflaglink

it's weird that anyone finds the 'other characters' boring, there are only a handful of them and I wouldn't have described Siobhan as boring, or Dominic, who is just tragic.

― akm, Sunday, November 27, 2022 9:44 PM (four weeks ago) bookmarkflaglink

oh wait, RAG means the characters in the movie describing other characters as dull, I misinterpreted that.

― akm, Sunday, November 27, 2022 9:45 PM (four weeks ago) bookmarkflaglink

also, I guess it's finally time to say Colin Farrel is an excellent actor; treating his good stuff as an exception these days doesn't give him the credit he deserves.

― akm, Sunday, November 27, 2022 9:46 PM (four weeks ago) bookmarkflaglink

I found this facile and predictable in the same manner as Triangle of Sadness, another one that left me cold

― “Cheeky cheeky!” she trills, nearly demolishing a roadside post (forksclovetofu), Sunday, November 27, 2022 9:57 PM (four weeks ago) bookmarkflaglink

Quite enjoyed this last week. It is dark as fook though.
I liked the sister too. Know I've seen her somewhere else.

I’m awake for no reason, it’s Christmas morning, let’s do this.

Firstly the film is very obviously allegorical to me. I’m sure everyone else got this too, there are several very blunt comparisons, but I haven’t seen it mentioned on here.

The elements of the film are very simple: a handful of characters, quite straightforward dialogue, some very clear allusions. I don’t think you can understand this film without understanding at least a little bit about the cultural context, though I think it succeeds outside that too.

Even the island’s name, Inisherin (Inis Éireann, in Irish, “The island of Ireland”) is a joke about this. You’ve got some classic elements: the priest, the banshee, the Garda. It’s a village with one pub and one church. Everything is very claustrophobic, like it is in Ireland itself; everyone knows other people’s business and who their families are. Mrs O’Riordan (the post office owner) is so small town rural Ireland, it made us laugh.

How successful an allegory is it? Well, I guess it depends on what that sets out to do within the film. There’s a few lines that dance around it, like when the Garda says about going to executions on the mainland and says something like “It’s the Free State executing the IRA…or was it the other way around?” Inisherin is interesting in the context of the war, immediately removed from it in a way that very few parts of Ireland actually were. The classic bit of civil war fiction that everyone in Ireland knows is The Sniper, which was on the national curriculum when I was at school. While the people on Inisherin view the events of the mainland as happening to other people, outside the microcosm of their island, in reality the civil war ticked most people in some way. Colm and Pádraic’s feud drags absolutely everyone into it. You can be certain everyone at Mass on a Sunday knows everything that’s happened.

I’m not certain the allegory sets out to tell us much about the war, but in any terms these are clear: it drags everyone into it, it’s brutal and hard to explain to outsiders, there are things you can never get over. Pretty straightforward. I think it works as an allegory but it’s more loosely allegorical than being constant pointed references. Given that most people watching this will not necessarily know anything about the civil war, that’s fine! (Another thing I thought was clearly directed at people from outside Ireland was everyone’s overuse of “feckin”, which I didn’t like. Absolutely nobody says it that much but it struck me as a modification to keep it from being rated higher? As I say, not one of my favourite parts, and the only one that came across as unenjoyably stage Irish.)

It’s really funny. Not like laugh out loud funny, but the humour is dark as McDonagh’s work tends to be and I loved it. Some highlights: “no other news”, the confession scenes, every single scene with Mrs McCormick including the one at the end where she’s sitting watching the lads like Death himself. (Which is what a banshee does after all.) Pádraic trying to hide behind the wall from her is great, he thinks he’s escaped her but no, Death is inescapable.

Siobhán’s clothes are colourful and stand out, the same way this “weird woman” stands out from everyone else committed to island life. I’ve loved Kerry Condon since Rome and she was so great in this? She made every scene she was in. It was good for the film as well, not just relying on standout performances from the leads, but strong throughout the cast. By the way, the publican and the fella at the bar (his echo) are Jon Kenny and Pat Shortt, a long-standing comedy duo well known in Ireland, and they had a series called Killinascully set in a rural town. It was a very different kind of humour but I’m guessing McDonagh was a fan. Anyway, I thought that was an amazing bit of casting.

Barry Keoghan was great in a difficult role: sympathetic but still comedic and heartbreaking too.

I have a lot more thoughts about this but I want to go back to sleep now.

I'm not usually a fan of McDonagh but this actually stuck with me and I will probably re-watch at some point, probably because the humour in it is dark and awkward and quite unfunny! From the trailer I thought this might be a crowd pleasing shite Irish comedy of bucolic wrongness with lots of fecking and so on, but there is some depth here and genuine sadness and I'm always a sucker for a sad movie with a very lovable border collie character.

Siobhán being the long suffering clever person on the island delivers the strongest mortal blow to Colm's turgid pomposity by correcting him that Mozart is from the 18th century ... actually!

xp this was also my fear, it was absolutely not that. Was laughing at some of the comments upthread which clearly expected it to be that. And yes, that Mozart line is great.

This was very good. My wife thought Siobhan and her eventual departure represented the "brain drain" that afflicted Ireland in the 20th century. I just finished the book We Don't Know Ourselves: A Personal History of Northern Island by Fintan O'Toole a few weeks ago and some of that was on my mind while I watched this.

Thanks for the added cultural context gyac. I also thought it was allegorical and took the Civil War references in that sense too — without knowing a lot of the details but understanding the through line of cycles of recrimination and contrariness. And yeah, Kerry Condon is great.

What I like about best about Colm is telling the priest in confession that we might as well all just pack up and go home if
punching a copper was a sin!

punching out the copper was his real confession

This was very good. My wife thought Siobhan and her eventual departure represented the "brain drain" that afflicted Ireland in the 20th century. I just finished the book We Don't Know Ourselves: A Personal History of Northern Island by Fintan O'Toole a few weeks ago and some of that was on my mind while I watched this.

Joyce, not Yeats. Point stands.

Apologies for my weird typo above (“Northern Island”).

it’s better to be kind than interesting.

Colm's melodies were so shit

Strongly disliked this, but the performances were largely good

^^^^^

why did you dislike it so much?

I liked this a lot. Reminded me a bit of Three Colors: White and also of Bresson.

I didn't dislike it all -- I found it unmemorable except for Colin Farrell's double takes and his chemistry with Brendan Gleason.

*at all

this is incredible and deserves a thread

I thought this movie fucking sucked.

Oh, great, now what do we do?

and his imaginary bread van xp

i dunno, maybe i didn't dislike it so much as it disappointed me? i was hoping for more. Found the story pat, the characterizations wonderfully realized but not particularly three dimensional and the direction intrusive and showy.

I’ve enjoyed Colin Farrell in Minority Report and in In Bruges but otherwise find myself allergic to him… haven’t made it more than 30 minutes into The New World, enjoyed Killing Of A Sacred Deer despite his presence, skipped The Lobster

That said there’s nothing I like more tho when I have the feeling of “coming around” to an actor who I previously disenjoyed (Nicole Kidman in To Die For broke my bias toward her and now I love her in everything). Hoping this movie does the same for me re Colin Farrell, ?

Yeah very interested to hear what you think, fgti!

funny to have Farrell recognisable at the moment isn't it. Last few things I've seen him in he seems to be intentionally trying to disguise himself.

He's also solid in the new After Yang.

Yeah I'm hoping I come around to Mr. Farrell and I'm going to watch this tonight. It really sucks to feel like I can't watch The New World because I just dislike his face in my eyeballs so much

There aren't many actors I feel this aversion toward, Gabriel Byrne and Stephen Rea are two others that spring to mind (so maybe I just like my Irish actors all silly-cheekbones like Barry Keoghan and Cillian Murphy)

Well I’ve got good news for you about the rest of the cast

I think it’s now past time to admit that Farrell is very good.

God knows I've tried to like Liam Neeson.

I was probably already a Farrell follower leading into it, but his take on Fright Night made me a forever fan.

In defence of Farrell, even if I don’t enjoy watching him act, he is v much a ride

and, I must say, he's gotten handsomer as he's aged.

He's outrageously pretty. I think that sometimes works against him.

He's powdery and almost feminine in After Yang, a mode I've never seen him in and it suits him.

I think he's almost always good, and for such a pretty guy his performances have no discernible vanity.

^otm

it wasn't an aversion to the Irish Kevin Webster that put me off this movie before I'd even watched it, it's McDonagh who put me off watching because normally I can't even get to the end of his movies I hate them that much.

Isn't Bobby Gillespie in danger of being typecast

Well I loved this. Colin Farrell’s performance was just wonderful tbh!!

From wiki, quoting Guy Lodge writing for Variety: “What begins as a doleful, anecdotal narrative becomes something closer to mythic in its rage and resonance: McDonagh has long fixated on the most visceral, vengeful extremes of human behavior, but never has he formed something this sorely heartbroken from that fascination.”

That’s a good description. The confrontation in the pub where he’s talking about everyone he’ll remember and all this hurt emerging has really stuck with me.

I'm curious as to why McDonagh titled two of his plays after two of the three Aran Islands but then set this film on a fictional island instead of setting it on the third of them

I thought this movie was great. Loved the humour.
I’m not really into film theory etc like some others here - but I though there was something to the sympathetic way Padraic treated creatures like his animals and Dominic vs how he was treated by Colm and the police officer etc. Maybe he just had a greater need for companionship and would tolerate a lot more than most of the other people. (Shrug emoji)

I'm curious as to why McDonagh titled two of his plays after two of the three Aran Islands but then set this film on a fictional island instead of setting it on the third of them

Ohhhhhh that is clever and I didn't catch that

Or you know, what I said above more coherently (I don’t blame you for scrolling through previous posts)

the line from this that’s sticking with me is when the pub owner tells padraic that he’s “one of life’s good guys”

Yeah. So many small memorable moments in this like that.

Oh yeah, I didn’t actually write about the two main characters.

Pádraic is brilliant and tragic and Farrell sells the role so much. I found it hard to laugh much at him despite the obvious comedic aspects to the character - all the scenes with Jenny (the donkey) in the house are far less “haha, the big eejit” when he’s living by himself with the cow and the pony.

Obviously the confrontation in the pub is the best scene but quite honestly he shines in every scene with everyone! When he says about burning down the house with all that hurt and pride and just faith in this obviously mad thing to do - so great.

Colm is such an interesting character. I really enjoyed the confession scenes with the priest, just great contrast in their temperaments, but somehow they seem more suited as friends than Colm and Pádraic.

But then again, Colm spends the whole film pulling away from what seems to have been the main relationship in his life, so you never see them interact during better times. You do get reflections of what their friendship must have been like: the boring chat, the honesty, the fact that Colm still listens to Pádraic and appears to agree with him even when Pádraic confronts him in the village pub in front of everyone they know.

Colm sitting with the Garda and laughing seems to Pádraic like he is flaunting it, like, I’d rather be friends with the biggest cunt in town than you, and Gleeson plays these less savoury aspects of his character very well.

Honestly loved them, they’ve worked together so well previously and I hope they do again

gyac, you've won me over. I'm gonna watch bits of it again tonight.

Colin Farrell's character is constantly called 'dull' and there's never an instance where he is!

I could never go with this movie after Gleeson cuts off his fingers , too silly and it doesnt work as a Civil War allegory either. If anything, its used as window dressing.

what Colm does is quite obviously ridiculous, but it didn't make me lose any interest in this world and just about every other character seems baffled by what he's doing! I thought one of the funniest scenes was the other musicians in the pub looking extremely awkward playing with him after he's really gone for it.

an act of violence that makes little sense to observers (those on the other side of the conflict and outwits it), inflicts great harm on the perpetrator ultimately spiting his own vocation, and finally results in the regrettable death of a civilian bystander. seems thematically coherent

outwith*

one of my favourite bits in the movie:

I wasn’t creeping up on ya.

I was sidling up on ya.

Between you and that ghoul, Jesus!

I always call her a ghoul, too, because she is a ghoul.

Jeez, we have a lot in common, don’t we? Me and you.

Calling old people ghouls and that.

Barry Keoghan is just heartbreaking. And like Farrell-Gleeson, it was interesting to see Farrell-Keoghan interacting again in such different roles from their last movie together.

he's a brilliant actor with a very rare face

https://images.hellomagazine.com/imagenes/film/20210917121924/the-north-water-meet-cast-bbc-two-drama/0-588-847/colin-farrell-z.jpg
https://www.indiewire.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/TheBatman.jpg
the previous couple of things I saw Colin Farrell in

some other geezer
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRgxio0FJdu3jYJq2yNHZIZAEDtp-hil6D9M7g6mJ1f1EyyRnZZyhv5lXuJkrjMOLMGVGw&usqp=CAU

“Maybe you never used to be” is such a devastating line lads

this scene made banshees of inisherin movie of the year for me pic.twitter.com/I7nFfwLWUn

— lauren 🫀 (@unrealshrike) December 29, 2022

it's a nice moment! there are about four of those at that level in this film.

Nice interview

https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/awards/story/2023-01-10/colin-farrell-brendan-gleeson-oscars-banshees-of-inisherin

That’s a lovely interview- thanks for sharing.

Man, those guys need their own "Fishing With John" type show, where they just have guests on and sit around at the pub.

Fabulous Farrell hair.

love him screaming about the no-competition oscars

Fabulous Farrell hair.

― Malevolent Arugula (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, January 10, 2023 8:13 PM (eleven minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

those eyebrows are what's giving me a glimmer of hope tbh

those too!

Watched this last night and intensely disliked it, maybe something wrong with me since I similarly hated In Bruges.

yes, your problem is that you are wrong and stupid (sorry, j/k)

I loved this.

tbf I am often wrong and stupid, but my problems with this are articulated upthread so I'm not entirely alone

ilx in general is getting increasingly defensive about stuff it likes not being liked by everyone, best not to worry about it

Also increasingly aggressive about pushing back against enthusiasm

To say nothing of the violent backlash to the backlash’s backlash

Gotta say it’s fucking hard to comment on this thread since I cut off my thumbs

You dullard!

Maybe you were never nice at all

I'm still trying to get my head around the idea that all the ale was bottled. I would have figured it would be in casks.

Also increasingly aggressive about pushing back against enthusiasm

― Malevolent Arugula (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Tuesday, January 10, 2023 6:19 PM (three hours ago)

Ha! When I think of the one person here who embodies this, it's you!

I liked this movie a lot. But I like it lazily, not enthusiastically. You can fight me about it. I won’t fight back.

I'm still trying to get my head around the idea that all the ale was bottled. I would have figured it would be in casks.

A good detail.

Another thing I thought was clearly directed at people from outside Ireland was everyone’s overuse of “feckin”, which I didn’t like

https://preview.redd.it/z3p90ryv63aa1.jpg?width=1988&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=c58f886211ef36f662b92341ae70fadd0215607d

:/

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Yeah that didn’t help, like watching a two hour episode of Father Ted with maiming.

is Collin saying "feckin" in that latimes interview? Maybe the only time that particular censorship matters.

It's LA, he was saying "flippin"

is Collin saying "feckin" in that latimes interview?

Definitely not

I think the url here is pretty self-explanatory.

http://www.back2stonewall.com/2023/01/watch-18-year-old-colin-farrell-modeling-a-thong-on-irish-tv-video.html

I still like the film, but I’m gritting my teeth really hard and going “death of the artist, death of the artist, death of the artist.” Fucking diaspora.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FmhLdvTXgAAZoXt?format=jpg&name=large

why do even the good and admirable actors have to be such fucking melts, lol!

That’s the director & writer!

oh I thought it was Gleeson, well N London 2nd gen Irish - say no more!

his brother is useless arsehole as well, but it doesn't diminish my liking of the movie. God knows how it somehow ended up better than good!

In spite of him, I guess.

Brendan Gleeson played Collins in The Treaty, there’s no way he’s that fucking ignorant.

I started watching one of his brother's movies, mainly because Gleeson was in it. It was so nauseating I gave up after 10 minutes. Definitely someone who wouldn't be getting ahead without a bit of nepotism.

i just watched this and i enjoyed it a lot, thanks gyac for this thread

banshees of inisherin is about softblocking a mutual

— gage (@neatsaux) January 20, 2023

This was a strange and somewhat off-putting movie but was interesting. I liked its theme of the narcissism of small differences

I'm all for Colin Farrell winning an Oscar

what you like about the movie has become everything I find off-putting about it since reading that bollocks from McDonagh. But a well made movie with some excellent individual performances can often transcend the worst ideas of a shitty hack director/writer, thankfully.

despite all of the hate, and realizing the criticism of it was valid and that it was somewhat shallow and inflammatory, I liked McDonagh's Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri. This film seems much less interesting in comparison

I think the url here is pretty self-explanatory.

http://www.back2stonewall.com/2023/01/watch-18-year-old-colin-farrell-modeling-a-thong-on-irish-tv-video.html

― a man often referred to in the news media as the Duke of Saxony (tipsy mothra), Sunday, January 15, 2023 6:02 AM (one week ago) bookmarkflaglink

bless you for this

confirmation that cf is hung like a horse. cheers

Or a donkey even.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FnT9nruXEAA4mtl?format=jpg&name=large

I did think Barry has the aura of someone who was dragged up, it turns out he was.

I have cooled a bit on this since I saw it but I’d be happy for the actors to win awards as they carry the whole film. Martin McD can lose his for all I care.

I'm remembering another reason I hated McD. The hilarious use of the r-word in the trailer for Three Billboards, to illustrate that the character in this movie is no-nonsense and says it like it is and is very funny with it.

I still like the film, but I’m gritting my teeth really hard and going “death of the artist, death of the artist, death of the artist.” Fucking diaspora.

https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FmhLdvTXgAAZoXt?format=jpg&name=large

― bit high, bitch (gyac), Sunday, 15 January 2023 14:25 (one week ago

This is my problem with people saying its an allegory. It is such a weak attempt at one and he displays a facile understanding of the Civil War like "hey, sometimes things be like that!"

Yeah when I posted after having just seen it I found that part not that convincing - and ofc I was ascribing MMcD having more understanding than he turned out to 😒

A really great piece in Slate about all this:

McDonagh himself has always sounded fairly noncommittal about his own claims to being an Irish writer; indeed, he has never—at least in interviews—seemed to give the concept all that much weight. In a 1998 conversation with the Irish critic and writer Fintan O’Toole, he said that “thinking about being Irish only came into my life when I decided to write Irish plays … It would be phony of me to say I have anything to do with Irish storytelling.” As off-the-cuff as these reflections are, they hint at something interesting and revealing about McDonagh’s work: that being an “Irish writer” might be a kind of choice, in the same way that it is a choice to work in a particular genre, such as crime or sci-fi, or Oscar-worthy drama.

As a metaphor it’s both vague and clumsy; for it to work, you’d have to think of the Irish Civil War was some kind of basically unfathomable squabble between former best friends, as opposed to a conflict over a treaty with the British government that granted only partial independence and divided Ireland into two political entities, to disastrous results. As a political allegory, it seems obviously retrofitted, tacked onto the narrative to add unearned resonance.

I don't think an artist has to fully understand their work on an intellectual level for it to be good. He still wrote and directed the thing, got the performances, etc, it's not really fair to say it's good in spite of him.

Separated into two trilogies, McDonagh's first six plays are located in and around County Galway, where he spent his holidays as a child

lol I didn't know about his "Irish plays" - what a pumper.

Came here to post that link. Mark O'C expresses precisely what I found so insufferable about the film.

I took the vague understanding of the Civil War as partly reflective of the island's isolation, they didn't really feel very connected to anything off the island anyway. (That it also apparently reflects McDonagh's own vague understanding of it doesn't necessarily change that. Although maybe it's unlikely that anyone in the country wouldn't have had an allegiance of some kind, I don't know.)

xxp

I think it is absolutely fair to say he is shit director (based on previous garbage he's made) and be surprised that this movie is likable despite having some ahistorical and absolute garbage ideas stitched into it.

I don't think an artist has to fully understand their work on an intellectual level for it to be good. He still wrote and directed the thing, got the performances, etc, it's not really fair to say it's good in spite of him.

I took the vague understanding of the Civil War as partly reflective of the island's isolation, they didn't really feel very connected to anything off the island anyway. (That it also apparently reflects McDonagh's own vague understanding of it doesn't necessarily change that. Although maybe it's unlikely that anyone in the country wouldn't have had an allegiance of some kind, I don't know.)

Many good points in that essay:

As a screenwriter, McDonagh evinces the theater-maker’s anxiety that the audience might go quiet, and never misses an opportunity to have a character make a humorous or provocative aside. You can always tell where you are supposed to gasp, and you can always tell when you’re supposed to be laughing—even, and especially, when you’re supposed to feel like you’re not supposed to be laughing.

OTM.

But as with Colm’s abrupt decision to end his friendship with Pádraic, no one seems to quite know what the fighting is all about. (“The free-state lads are executing a couple of the IRA lads—or is it the other way around?” says a character at one point.) As a metaphor it’s both vague and clumsy

yep

he has an extremely hokey and limited understanding of rural ireland, to the point of insult even raking into account he isnt dealing in realism

i think i posted about him previously that three billboards was merely his doing to america what he does to ireland

I disagree with the article a bit about the tropeyness of the characters, cos I thought that did work. It reminded me a bit of watching Slumdog Millionaire with my better half, who was pointing out all the references to tropes in classic Indian films that existed. So i don’t mind that as much as the writer did. But my original objections - the stageyness of some of the dialogue, the allegory not really working - are in accord with his, I think. Probably the most brutally otm take of that is when the observation is made that In Bruges features Irish characters - but they just happen to be Irish. It has nothing to tell us about the country or the people. And ofc, it stands on stellar performances.

he writes great parts in watchable movies with shite plots with idiotic broader points and yes he casts brilliantly or his dialogues just sparkles well

his profundity is the fauxest possible and the attempts demean all involved but especially any reviewer that approves of the attempt i think

the scenery is good tho

I think his humour is pretty dark and I was laughing at a few points in the film (to the surprise of my mother who thought it was sad), and the confrontation scene in the pub is classic: the spareness of what is said, the rest of what is unsaid, the performances.

It’s just…ugh.

yes he casts brilliantly

It's no secret that excellent actors can accentuate whatever is good and paper over the weaknesses in a poorly written script.

even so line by line he has jewels but not without the clunkers

its in the round its revealed as tripe usually imo

his ear for irish accents is a minor gripe for wider audiences im sure but let me tell you it has spoiled utterly more than one production and this is no different from clips ive seen

Sorry now

Sorry

I’ve met you

And you didn’t say “feck” every other word

Are you sure you’re from the west?

the odd clunker as i say

It felt more like a fable, not a real historical place, which I was fine with.

I don't think an artist has to fully understand their work on an intellectual level for it to be good.

?????

I think it's very common that artistic decisions are made on a more intuitive level, which is why some artists shouldn't or don't talk about their own work very much. Or, it's often in retrospect that artists intellectualize their own work. Overthinking it during creation can ruin it, or feel like it will.

fuck me, is this below average movie hack an "artist" now? I can't have that.

im pretty sure that distance would help with the fable element, certainly

i dont ask that his work be any better than seven psychopaths, which it isnt, but great monstrous performances do not great movies or plays make

It felt more like a fable, not a real historical place, which I was fine with

Yeah I don’t think the problem is that McDonagh is overthinking his work.

Yeah I totally get being too close to the subject matter, I've been on that side of it too

There's sort of a dream-logic feel too with the fingers

Yeah I totally get being too close to the subject matter, I've been on that side of it too

man is allowed have opinions whats the point of a civil war otherwise

Nahin civil about it

not with you involved begod

mainlanders whod have em

Yeah I totally get being too close to the subject matter, I've been on that side of it too

And yet, to continue to post such embarrassing opinions!

I've learned from those experiences that people aren't dumb or wrong for enjoying things just because it's operating on a different level for them.

I couldn't even really experience Whiplash or Treme because the specifics were so distracting, but it's fine if other people enjoy them without having had those specific experiences. Knowing too much about something almost invariable ruins a movie or show about it, lol.

it certainly ruined Garfield for me

Incredibly ignorant.

Ok

you know what, i just realized that i have been confusing Martin McDonagh with John Michael McDonagh, whose excellent Calvary with Gleeson (and the more problematic but still worth seeing War on Everyone) had kept me coming back to Martin McD after I hated 3 billboards (and got me into the theater for this one) because i felt like he had proven to be a capable craftsman. not so sure now!

I can't believe there is a fucking extended family of these useless cunts all doing the same job, good job they aren't plumbers!

not sure it works as plumbers promote the free flow of shit!!

(I enjoyed this movie. Just matching the current energy in here.)

lol I watched it 3 times!

lmao

John M McD's The Guard is a fairly decent film too!

Marty was an EP on that

what's the condition that describes when you really like a movie that is fairly bad? I watched Martin Eden about a dozen times even though I think it is objectively a badly written and rather daft movie.

visual masochism?

Banshees will have The Big Lebowski lasting power. On Halloween, instead of a Westerley zip-up sweater, we will fake cut off our fingers. Replace the white russian with a fiddle. In place of philosophy, we will overestimate our knowledge of the Irish Civil War.

no, because I'm talking about even though you know it's rubbish that you are watching but still find it an inexplicably an uplifting experience.

Cinemanabon

that sounds like nostalgia?

Regrettably, you can only cut off all your fingers once. Martin takes advantage.

i think i posted about him previously that three billboards was merely his doing to america what he does to Ireland

This is it. I remember someone on here saying about that film, "I prefer his stuff when it's set in Ireland"

Well, you would, not being from the place.

“People say you should only write what you know. But you only write what you know because you are too fucking stupid to make anything up.”

^^^

a quote from the "artist" himself on this

One of the parts of the essay that I kept thinking about was this:

W.B. Yeats and J.M. Synge, both Anglo-Irish—Irish, that is, but members of a Protestant ruling class descended from the original English colonial settlers—were among the most prominent of the Revival’s writers, and both contributed to this focus on rural poverty as the true soul of Irishness. As well-intentioned as the Abbey’s mission might have been as a contribution to Irish cultural self-consciousness, and as aesthetically powerful as the plays often were, this stuff unwittingly reasserted England’s colonial hegemony by staging Ireland as an unsophisticated peasant culture.

Yeats did not rate Pearse highly, believing that he had been made dangerous by 'the vertigo of self-sacrifice. As a young man, Pearse had thought badly of Yeats, dismissing him as 'a mere English poet of the third or fourth rank', but later recognised his literary achievement and invited him to speak to his pupils at St. Enda's.

Pearse was probably responsible for much of the text of the 1916 proclamation while his complex personality and passionate rhetoric still define the Rising for many people.

A fifth leader, James Connolly, is named in the rousing final stanza. Connolly, a socialist thinker and Trade Union organiser, is not mentioned in the body of the poem. With his conservative leanings, Yeats would not have had much time for Connolly's politics, but did recognise his importance as did Yeats's friend, George Russell (AE) who admired Connolly and felt that he had been the main inspiration behind the Rising:

Yeats ofc essentially recanted a lot of his original opinion (as expressed through his contemporary work) on nationalism and those parts of it he had what would we say a distaste for, but i think true to put it that he did so by elevating the nobility of it in his mind such that it became worthy of his aesthetic ideal and not by ever subjugating the latter to the realities

aesthetics and biting his own liver in poetbro impotent fury at sean mcbride are the two main facets of yeats opinions on nationalism until yerman was dead and no longer plowing (and starring nest pas) his mott

Yeah ofc he did change his views later in life but the work of his that is most known re nationalism is predating that

Yeats supported the striking workers in the lockout. R.F. Foster's VOL 1: THE APPRENTICE MAGE (1997), p.500, records his notes from a public meeting on the event which were then sent as an open letter to Jim Larkin's IRISH WORKER paper (published 1st November 1913).

I quite like the film but don't love it, don't think it's immensely great or tells me the essential truth about Ireland or anywhere. A quite distinctive quirky drama.

That’s not a correction to what I said, though. Yeats wrote about it, Connolly was out there with the workers.

Tweet thread by Drew D

I mean it’s nice and all but he doesn’t even read the essay until someone links it to him in the replies, lol

There needs to be a word for this phenomenon, where you append a 'lmao' onto any intellectual flex, in case somebody calls you on it. pic.twitter.com/XqUFA4HrDu

— Elvis Buñuelo (@Mr_Considerate) January 27, 2023

ah, that first sighting of "Irish writer" discourse of the day is always the freshest. "Wait until they find out about Brendan O'Neill" ho ho ho LMAO! etc

I haven't read any essays on the film, but tweeter Bunuelo is correct. Say what you have to say and stand by it, don't add a defensive, offensive initialism.

The other tweeter he's commenting on is somewhat misleading in various ways. For one thing, Wilde is now widely thought of as an Irish writer, but about 30-40 years ago, among many British people, he wasn't. (Maybe he was in Ireland.) And while many people love Wilde, no-one would turn to him for a direct rendition of Irish experience, as he didn't write directly about Ireland.

The same is mostly true of Beckett, who mostly, after c.1940, writes about abstract or unnamed places. A great Irish writer, but not exactly a guide to Ireland.

Yeats spent much time outside Ireland but also much time in Ireland, and was a Senator and helped design the currency (for good or ill). It's reasonable to say that he had a huge amount of experience of Ireland (of a particular kind).

Joyce spent most of his life outside Ireland but wrote about an Ireland which he had intensely experienced and remembered, and with which he remained in a way obsessed. So his case is totally different from someone who didn't grow up there. (Nothing wrong with those people either.)

I've also just noticed that said tweeter spells 'umbrage' as 'umbridge'. He's spending too much time listening to The Archers.

I think anybody who posts "wait until they find out about Shane McGowan" as a witty repartee towards people who have been critical of McD are either very young or just plain clueless!

pinefox why is "lmao" offensive? Genuinely curious in case it comes over as argumentative.

xxp I don’t mean to be rude but those arguments are absolute nonsense (the ones you are responding to, not the ones you are making, which are broadly otm) that are usually put about by people with interest in denying Ireland any kind of cultural legacy. It’s not remotely good faith.

In any case, the emigrant experience is a huge part of Irishness across the generations. That Joyce lived outside Ireland is neither here nor there for the argument; he was writing from his direct experience growing up, not from something imagined. Someone else pointed out re Shane McGowan that he had written quite a lot from the diaspora point of view, which is very much its own thing and a worthy subject in and of itself.

A lot of this is tension between those of us born in Ireland and the diaspora, which has a long running element not obvious to outsiders. I don’t really care about the opinions of someone whose ancestors emigrated during the Famine regarding modern Ireland; that’s not denying their family’s origin. There’s an extremely bad faith line about “wow, you think someone born to Irish parents in London isn’t Irish enough, I wonder what you think of black Irish people,” which completely elides the fact that 1) diaspora Irish are entitled to citizenship under jus sanguinis even if their relative was a grandparent whereas the pretty racist nationality law is much harder for someone who is born to two foreign parents and 2) the opinions of someone born to one or more foreign parents in Ireland or someone from a minority background are going to be more immediately relevant and of interest than someone, such as Martin McDonagh, who never bothered thinking of his Irishness until he decided to start writing Irish plays!

And I don’t think someone from a minority background in Ireland ever has that opportunity to opt out and not have those thoughts, it is forced upon you, because Ireland is more diverse than it was when I was a child.

Anyway my tl;dr is that some diaspora have interesting things to say but their opinions are not intrinsically worthwhile by dint of being diaspora, and all the Irish-Americans mad about this essay can really just stay mad about it, because they’ve insisted on being seen in an argument that’s not really about them and more about what portrayals of the country are seen to be acceptable and true by outsiders.

xp

not posting as pinefox, but I'd guess it could be taken offensively in a "lol, you are an idiot and me, I'm the smartest person in the room and I'm laughing at you" kind of way.

Sorry, that part about opting out, I just left that thought right there: although Ireland is much more diverse than it was when I was a child, the country is still quite racist and it can’t be easy to grow up an ethnic minority there.

I can remember in the early 80's there was apparently (according to what family said) one South Asian family in the whole of Tralee.

And I mentioned it maybe on the thread about abortion, but a lot of Irish-Americans are backward fucks who have historically done things like contribute to funds to keep abortion illegal in Ireland, and whose image of the country is completely out of date. I’ve heard from friends about Irish-Americans showing up and looking askance that not everyone is white and living in thatched cottages. Usually diaspora from the UK just from proximity get it a bit more, but there’s that element as well. Basically if you have grown up gay or female or from any sort of minority in the modern country, someone clinging onto the worst aspects of the old country is…a lot.

And please don’t take this as an invitation to talk about your background if you’re Irish-American to me, I truly don’t care, because I am explaining the point of difference that exists as I have experienced it. I also have relatives from that background, it’s not something I need explained. Thanks!

I can remember in the early 80's there was apparently (according to what family said) one South Asian family in the whole of Tralee.

follow up from this guy is even worse

I’m trying to imagine any reality in which you could grow up with Irish parents in England at the height of the Troubles and not be acutely aware of Irish culture.

— William Friedkin Truths (@LazlosGhost) January 26, 2023

hah some O'Neil brained shit there

obviously the superficial cultural knowledge picked up on a two week holiday in Eire every year was invaluable. But also I'd like to thank Bono for teaching me about The Troubles!

did we ever find out if McDonagh comes from peasant stock?

I was reading earlier that Oscar Wilde's Irish mum was more likely to be from peasant stock than that bald buffoon. She claimed her grandfather was an Italian who had emigrated to Eire in the 18th century, but apparently, she actually was the grandchild of some labourers from Durham!

follow up from this guy is even worse

🐦[I’m trying to imagine any reality in which you could grow up with Irish parents in England at the height of the Troubles and not be acutely aware of Irish culture.
— William Friedkin Truths (@LazlosGhost) January 26, 2023🕸]🐦

not necessarily comfortable with midlanders speaking to a clearly islander experience itt tbh

sure I’m from an island too…the big island 😎

ms. appropriation

You know you have to watch this shite now so you can properly go in on this thread right

i hope i love it or ill be thrown off the island

outwith*

― LaMDA barry-stanners (||||||||), Friday, 30 December 2022 20:20 (four weeks ago) bookmarkflaglink

Spot the Scots interloper.

we watched it again. I like to watch it. Takes me out of myself.

I enjoyed this for the acting, but agree that as a metaphor or allegory it's pretty thin.

Also a peeve of mine, when the writing is often people repeating the previous line back and forth.

Check on the donkey will you?
You want me to check in the donkey?
Aye, check on the donkey.
Then I'll check on the donkey.

Can I buy you a pint?
You want to buy me a pint?
Yes, I'd like to buy you a pint.
Then stop talking and buy me a pint.
Okay, I'll buy you a pint.

the dialogue is the part of the writing we like, though.

Would have maybe made a better stage play.

I don't know. Shots of cloud islands above land islands also seemed important to success.

see this is why im here and here only the tourist board of the island would like me to remind you all that you can enjoy all of the locations but without many of the paper thin characterisations so this seems like a good time for me to underline that point

Watched this yesterday with reasonably high expectations. I didn’t know a lot about the movie ahead of time, good or bad. But the trailer looked good and it’s got a lot of awards/nominations, so…

Had I fully understood that it was the same guy behind Three Billboards I would have entered with more trepidation.

Anyway, I enjoyed it at the start. Looked good, performances were good, and it walked the line between comedy and drama. And the theme of “friend divorce” resonated.

But the more it went on, the worse it got. To the point that I absolutely hated the whole endeavor by the end. A lot of the reasons have been better articulated in this thread already.

The premise of this film had so much potential but it never dug beyond the initial set of plot points—Colm inexplicably stops being friends with Padraic is unsatisfied by that development. It could have gone *anywhere* from here and as best I can tell McDonagh thought “pat allegory for civil war” was the best option.

I think the thing that frustrates me most was that Colm’s motivations and internal logic were not only inscrutable to Padraic, they seemed to be inscrutable to McDonagh too. His desire to spend the remainder of his life dedicated to artistic/intellectual pursuits was undercut at every turn. Not just the most obvious and perplexing actions with tanked the whole plot, but also little things, like… he didn’t seem all that good or committed to music. He never got his ass out of the pub. He seemed to think that the *only* thing holding back his rewarding life was this one guy’s boring stories. He wasn’t well read nor did he seem to have any desire to be. To think that he had some grand epiphany about how he wanted to spend the rest of his life, and it all boiled down to cutting off all contact with one single guy, in a town where close contact is inevitable (one pub, one church, one store). His position was a farce from the outset and McDonagh never gave the character any real chance to make us believe otherwise. So maybe Colm was actually resigned to his own nihilism from the start and cutting himself off from Padraic was more of a first step toward pure solipsism… which might justify his most dramatic action but again he had no interest in cutting contact with others, and he wasn’t so resigned that he didn’t stay in house at the final climactic moment.

they seemed to be inscrutable to McDonagh too

I was wondering if I missed a metaphor or something, so googled, and found an interview with McDonagh where he conceded the cutting off of fingers was just an idea that came to him, with not much deeper meaning.

“I thought it was interesting that an artist would threaten the thing that allows him to make art,” McDonagh said. “Does that thing make him the artist?”

Yeah, but wtf does it have to do with the movie you actually *made*?

thank you pgwp for that precise dissection of my own hatred of the film
(and hi dmac!)

dmac back to Press the Green Button

xps i don't think colm actually resented padraig because he was a distraction from his musical ambitions. that might have been the story he told himself, but his behavior tells a different story. i think he was jealous that padraig was content with his life on inisherin. colm felt the need to protest his existence, but since he didn't know what *else* he wanted out of life, the protest was both incoherent and directed mostly against himself.

best part of the movie was siobhan correcting colm about mozart. colm was full of shit.

I've been carefully following this discussion to help me decide whether this is the sort of film I would get enjoyment from. so far, the nays have it. carry on. i'm enjoying the discussion on its own merits.

viewing this film as a “pat allegory for civil war” is pretty reductionist, it is entirely enjoyable without even factoring that aspect in.

In fact, I enjoyed it without it; the pat stuff is so pat it barely plays a role. As a modest (more or less) chamber piece about two characters it's fine on its own, minus any attempt at metaphor or allegory. So I'd say go for it, Aimless, it's barely two hours long.

I’m just trying to ascertain McDonagh’s own goals as the writer and filmmaker. The civil war metaphor is there, and the chamber piece about two characters is there. I don’t know which path McDonagh meant to foreground but either way I think he failed

i don't feel that this aspect is foregrounded, or at least, I don't think assessing the film with the idea that this is paramount and integral to the story does it any service, which clearly this discussion has supported. The thing is it is not a pat metaphor, really, and doesn't really work. AT best it's a messy metaphor. As such I think it adds something, but isn't necessary to appreciate the film, which in my mind works much better as an interpersonal character study.

If only we had some way to know what the director’s intention was!
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FmhLdvTXgAAZoXt?format=jpg&name=large

Like, I don’t care if you personally choose to ignore that, as I said upthread gritting my teeth and saying “Death of the author” is basically my only remaining way of enjoying the stuff I did liked. But it’s a total lie to say that obvious link wasn’t intended. It’s really, really, really not remotely a clever film.

every time I see that quote again I want him to die a horrible death, even more.

I mean it would be odd to set the film in that extremely specific period of Irish history if you didn't mean something by it. Of course you could certainly have the same story take place in a contemporary setting but there would be less opportunity for cheap metaphor and donkey-based humour (although there appear to be a not insignificant amount of Americans tweeting about how they thought the film was set in the present day. So who knows)

I liked this film.

I took a lot more away from it about the idea of male stubbornness and refusal to deal with depression/emotions in a healthy way, than the obvious civil war analoy (which was really only a tacked-on couple of comments and didnt seem the point, to me).

jamelle bouie with a souring evaluation of mcdonagh films

https://letterboxd.com/jbouie/film/three-billboards-outside-ebbing-missouri/

That’s a great evaluation. Plenty of people posting in this thread could learn from that!

Saw this last night and never quite believed in it. I've slept on it and in honesty, cast and photography aside (big ifs, sure), this felt televisual to me; if I'd watched it out of the corner of my eye, it could have been a Sunday night misery-porn fiesta to watch before bed - just with a big SCRIPT chucked at it. And because of all that, I felt like the cast - Farrell in particular - were desperately trying to convince the audience that any of this was vaguely plausible. I don't claim to have any deep understanding of the civil war but a couple of times I asked myself out loud 'if this is some cheap allegory for the civil war, then jesus'.

Great thread, ilx.

The Civil War allegory really provides zero of what I liked about the movie, successful or not. To me it works better as an allegory about undiagnosed mental illness, as well as provincial resentments and hostilities. And yes, it works even better than that as an acting showcase, so you could argue McDonough got away with one here.

perhaps the point of the civil war allegory is that while colm's stand was, from his perspective, principled, he ultimately hurt himself most of all. he must represent the anti-treaty side of the conflict imo.

he was after all within his rights to demand full independence from padraig. but the bitterness with which he pursued this end showed that he cared more about the conflict itself than the freedom he said he wanted. i think the movie is saying something like that. i do not know enough about irish history to say whether this is a fair evaluation of the IRA though.

This individual thinks the film is more telling about Covid-19.

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2023/feb/14/cut-off-from-the-main-how-films-about-islands-reflect-our-anxious-divided-times

i hope that individual got a pass mark for whatever module that collection of sentences was originally submitted for

if mcdonagh has the moral fibre to set his next work in eighties london and tackle whatever complex tableau of identity and trauma most conveniently presents itself to the characters thus situated I'll at least take back some of my current most deeply established opinions about him- that he is the cheapest type of faux profound gifted stylist. hes barely a level above the political or social commentary that could be reasonably attributed to a gaultier collection in 1997 oh how clever how daring nb ive still not seen this

Uhhhh do you mind darraghmac my enjoyment of the film wasn’t affected at all by the stuff that doesn’t matter to me

xxp

yeah but what about the graun piece? (ho ho ho). I used to know this guy known as DJ Dave who once made this hilarious "don't take smack video" whilst on a vid-editing course offered to the terminally unemployed in the mid 90's. He was a fucking idiot, but still probably better suited to writing allegorical dramas about [whatever] than this cunt, still more talented.

nb i still think mcdonagh can write dialogue that gives actors a great platform which isnt nothing

hes been very ill served by plaudits is i think my take

I think it's more a case of good actors managing to cast off from a rotten platform than t'other way round.

but I did 3 times watch it over the christmas period and enjoyed it tbh

its fair possible that im only avoiding this because of the weight attributed it! if nobody gave mcdonagh undue credit thematically id enjoy all his stuff perhaps

insofar as i grew up at all or anywhere i grew up within three miles of seventy percent of the exterior shots so i will out of duty catch it at some stage im sure

A smart friend whose tastes in film are at best erratic recommended Calvary, which somehow didn't catch my attention in 2014; we had no idea the directors were related, for starters. It's better about its Local Colo(u)r than Banshees, though it collapses into meanwhile-back-at staging. It didn't earn its ending. Brendan Gleason, relying on that Stephen Rea thing of investing monosyllables with untapped reserves of feeling, is by far the best thing about it.

I finally got around to watching this yesterday, and here are my thoughts. I had them before opening this delightful thread, but I did my due diligence and caught up so my words may be colored by the opinions already stated here:
- The beginning of the movie sets itself up as this parable about the man who thought he was interesting in opposition to the man he feels is dull (but identifies as "nice"). It quickly becomes clear they live in a very small community and avoiding interaction is going to be impossible. Then! We get this self-mutilation threat should the nice man continue his interactions. Now we're cooking!
- This kind of works for a while. We get the sidebar bits with Dominic and Siobhán, which are delightful if somewhat harrowing in Dominic's case.
- We get some indications, not-so-subtly dropped, that there is a civil war going on across the way. Uh oh, I smell an allegory.
- It wasn't initially clear but that was a bad smell. It gets worse.

Overall, great acting, excellent dialogue in parts, the plot as a whole is kind of a clunker

McDonagh definitely writes the slightly exaggerated dialogue that makes the characters come off a bit larger, definitely reminiscent of what you get in stage plays where people in the cheap seats might not be getting all the small bits and expressions so everything's a little over-telegraphed when it's on film. I would question whether it's intentional that the characters come off as caricatures, but I don't think as a writer he's even considered doing things differently.

There's this kind of belligerent Tarantino-ness to his dialogue which is pretty fun but maybe tiring after awhile

I saw the trailer for this a few months ago and, for whatever reason, figured it wasn't for me. But a friend urged me to see it after relating a recent situation in my own life virtually identical to Pádraic's; equally blindsided, no explanation (Colm did have one), a friend of 50 years.

I can't say for sure how I would have felt absent that--I don't know that it would have made all that much difference--but I really liked it. I don't know if Colm's extreme course of action (without being more specific than that if you haven't seen it) was necessary--I think the film would have been as strong without that--but obviously it's central to the film. Going to hazard a guess that I wouldn't think nearly as highly of the two acting categories that won AAs (only one of which I'll get around to seeing) as the two here that were nominated. Also think Brendan Gleeson should have been nominated.

He was!

Pádraic is genuinely nice. I was thinking about two people I have a certain degree of involvement with in my small town who are always posting those terrible memes on Facebook about how to properly treat people and what it means to be a good person. They're both a few years older than I am. I can't think of two ruder, less nice people. Are they even remotely aware of the disconnect between the stuff they post and the way they actually conduct themselves?

i’m not puttin’ me donkey outside when i’m sad either.

The tiny donkey was my favorite character in the movie.

I can't believe there were two prominent donkey films this year. That's got to be a record (by two) for almost every year ever.

I loved the emotional support donkey

The donkey was the the only redeeming part of the movie, it's fate was a sadistic turn in the plot.

This was highly entertaining, mostly because of the acting and the beautiful locations took me back to my visit to Inishmore. Didn't really think it had as much to say as it thought it did.

I think you could just enjoy it for all of that, and also for the Local Hero-type humour ("Let's not skip ahead..."). But I did think the film's central theme as explained by Colm (give or take a century) was valid and handled well. The only thing I question is Colm's threat, which seemed a little gimmicky (plus I'm squeamish).

https://bansheesthegame.com/

I can't believe there were two prominent donkey films this year. That's got to be a record (by two) for almost every year ever.

― clemenza, Sunday, March 19, 2023 9:39 PM (six days ago) bookmarkflaglink

There were actually donkeys in four Oscar-nominated films: Banshees, EO, Triangle of Sadness, and Navalny.

Didn’t really do it for me

not enough donkey

Among other things

This has pretty much shrunk in my imagination since watching it. Still, I can't quite shake the directness and obscenity of the central conceit - to the point that with people who know the reference, I'll frequently say something like 'are you going to make me cut off one of my fingers?'

This makes me wonder if, a bit like with the lol swearing of In Bruges, it'll endure in a vaguely cultish/catchphrase kind of fashion.

Saw this last night. All I can add to this discourse is that the donkey shared a name with my recently deceased cat so its death and aftermath was hard for me to watch.

just heard McDonagh on the radio blathering on about "petty outrage" and "people with an axe to grind". He's British to the core.

Based on the audience response here, somebody needs to sign that donkey to a multi-film contract before it acquires an agent.

xp in relation to the type of criticism mentioned upthread?

I would guess so, was just half listening and thinking who is this wanker. He was complaining about dialogue that is tailored towards what the audience expects, but he went short of using "woke". Then the interview finished and I realised who it was and it all made perfect sense!

Take yr soup & sit down Martin

I'll give a more comprehensive report if I'm unfortunate enough to hear it again next I'm falling asleep with WS on the radio.

its in relation to conversations from some theatres and groups about moderating language from his earlier plays i believe