written and directed by
Martin McDonagh
One of the stronger contenders for Oscar glory this year is the off-the-wall tragicomedy The Banshees of Inisherin, directed by British-Irish writer-director Martin McDonagh, who reteams with Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson, the gentlemen with whom he made his feature film directorial debut, In Bruges.
Set in Ireland (or in a fictional island of the coast of Ireland) in 1923, during dying days of the Irish Civil War, The Banshees of Inisherin is the story of two lifelong friends and drinking buddies, Padraic (Farrell) and Colm (Gleeson) whose friendship takes an abrupt turn for the unexpected when Colm, a folk musician who plays the violin, suddenly decides he does not want to be friends with Padraic anymore, much to the latter's befuddlement as well as the confusion of the tiny village, including the bartender Jonjo (Pat Shortt) and Padraic's sister Siobhan (Kerry Condon). Eventually Colm explains that he wants to spend the rest of his life writing music for which he will be remembered rather than wasting his time idly chatting with a dullard like Padraic. Heartbroken, Padraic at first tries to cope by hanging out with the town idiot, a boy Dominic (Barry Keoghan) who is constantly abused by his father , who also happens to be the local policeman (Gary Lydon), but it just isn't the same. Padraic tries to force the issue with Colm, who then makes a chilling threat: if Padraic won't leave him alone, he will cut a finger off his violin playing hand every time Padraic talks to him. Will he make good on this threat?
This movie with its strange mix of deadpan humor and downright grisliness makes a lot more sense when one has seen In Bruges, which featured two hitmen, also played by Farrell and Gleeson, who are lying low in the idyllic Belgian town of Bruges following an assignment gone wrong. I enjoyed the strange mix of quips and occasional slapstick that permeated the film, so much so that when it came to its violent denouement, I really wasn't all that bothered by it. It was a film that featured hitmen, after all.
The Banshees of Inisherin has a very similar sensibility to In Bruges and its strength lies in its dialogue penned by McDonagh who was a playwright years before he started making movies. There's not a whole lot of broad humor here, but I found myself laughing time and again in spite of myself. It's also genuinely interesting how it tackles concepts that people didn't really understand back then. Colm, for example, is grappling with what appears to be a deep depression, which his priest (David Pearse) refers to as "despair." This does put a lot of Colm's actions in the film into their proper context.
It also helps that the actors have such great chemistry. Gleeson and Farrell, even when they're feuding onscreen, make a compelling comic duo, as do Farrell and Condon as siblings. Keoghan, playing an awkward teen at the ripe old age of 30, whose Dominic has a crush on Siobhan effectively projects a figure that is both comic and tragic at the same time.
If I had any nitpick about this film it would be with its occasionally anachronistic dialogue. I'd be happy to be corrected, but I feel relatively certain that expressions like "mental" and "judgy" were not in popular use a hundred years ago. It doesn't really take anything away from the story but it is occasionally distracting.
This film achieves the absurdist approach that Noah Baumbach tried a bit to convey with White Noise. Even when the characters are acting at their strangest, the whole thing seems believable because McDonagh has given them believable dialogue and not text that feels like it's being read out of a book.
It is well worth the time to watch this film.
9.5/10
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