IRISH REVIEW: Intermission (2003)

Though it would obviously be foolish to claim that Intermission owes more of a debt to something like Paul Thomas Anderson’s Magnolia than to films like Pulp Fiction and Snatch, Intermission is nonetheless much more a film about people than it is a self-consciously stylish showcase for violence and other things that its director finds cool. Director John Crowley and writer Mark O’Rawe (the not as successful Perrier’s Bounty) feature a variety of interlinking characters and plotlines but they never forget that the film is ultimately just about people trying to get by in life and love.

Small-time thief John (Cillian Murphy) decides to test the sincerity of his girlfriend Deirdre’s (Kelly MacDonald) feelings for him by breaking up with her. This all backfires when she is left broken-hearted and shortly afterwards takes up with a married man Sam (Michael McElhatton), who leaves his wife Noeleen (Deirdre O’Kane) devastated. Noeleen is encouraged to go out and try to find another man. Meanwhile, John’s love-starved best friend Oscar (David Wilmot) becomes increasingly depressed and his other friend Mick (Brían F. O’Byrne) is left unemployed when a small boy (Taylor Molloy) throws a rock through the front windshield of his bus, resulting in a remarkable crash involving Deirdre’s mother Maura (Ger Ryan) and sister Sally (Shirley Henderson), which sparks the interest of a documentary crew led begrudgingly by Anthony (Rory Keenan) who would much rather be filming the tough life on the streets of policeman Gerry Lynch (Colm Meaney) Gerry has it in for local hood Lehiff (Colin Farrell), who may have a proposition for John and Mick.

Intermission is a reasonably convoluted film but it doesn’t let itself get too bogged down in exposition. It is primarily the story of John and Deirdre with additions from a supporting cast, who have their own problems, some not as interesting as others but there is a general feeling of a close-knit community in an optimistic post-Tiger Dublin. If it isn’t the most taut plotting, it is forgivable since life is never simple and because the film romps along at a nice pace and a likable and easy-going tone. Cillian Murphy and Kelly MacDonald do well, but their parts are somewhat underwritten to make room for all the other characters, many of whom are very good. David Wilmot has a larger role here than many of his more recent roles and proves to be a very likable presence, as does Brían F. O’Byrne, Michael McElhatton and Deirdre O’Kane. Colm Meaney plays his typical role, the hard man who doesn’t realize how funny he is to other people, but he does it well here thanks mainly to a good script – something clearly missing when he took on similar roles in Whole Lotta Sole and A Belfast Story. Colin Farrell gets a great opening (with excellent use of ‘Out of Control’ by U2 – so exciting for an Irish film at the time and now, in retrospect, so optimistic) but he is surprisingly kept largely to the background until towards the end of the film.

What is so likable about Intermission though is the fact that it avoids the cool style and ‘funny’ violence that was so in vogue at the time that the film was made, preferring a light tone and a hand-held feel, making it a film about people, not trendy pop culture references, crime and violence. It is, more than anything else, a comedy and a rather funny one at that, though it is one that doesn’t avoid the more harrowing and gritty side of life on the streets of Dublin – the mean streets, as Meaney’s Lynch prefers to call them, though only to heighten his own hard-as-nails image.

As the film plays out, it becomes unclear what exactly the unifying theme behind the whole thing is, but by then, it also ceases to matter. It ends up being a small and really rather charming film – not wholly successful but certainly good enough – a pleasant surprise given the poster that was very suggestive of Trainspotting and Snatch. In the end, its primary value is that it is entertaining, full of good performances from a whole pile of recognisable faces (I didn’t even mention Tom Murphy, Conleth Hill, Laurence Kinlan and Ruth McCabe). It is mostly light, fairly unexpected and quite a bit of fun. And with a major stunt that was said to be the most expensive thing in Irish cinema at the time.

DVD REVIEW: I Went Down (1997)

Made in 1997, I Went Down is probably one of the first of the post-Tarantino Irish gangster comedies of which there are now way too many. Indeed, to watch I Went Down is to notice how similar it is to later films, such as Intermission and Perrier’s Bounty, in terms of tone and in terms of the characters. As the original though, I Went Down is still thoroughly entertaining.

Git Hynes (Peter MacDonald) is just out of prison and has nowhere to go. He meets up with an old friend Anto (David Wilmot) and is almost immediately caught up in an gang punishment. Protecting Anto from a violent gangster Johnner (Michael McElhatton), Git comes to the attention of boss Tom French (Tony Doyle). To make amends, he has to do a job. Teamed with one of French’s men, Bunny Kelly (Brendan Gleeson), Git and Bunny must drive to Cork in search of a man, Frank Grogan (Peter Caffrey), who has unfinished business with French. The job turns out to be much harder than it at first seemed.

In its opening moments, I Went Down feels like a typical Irish gangster comedy, with a luckless lead character, a typical role for Brendan Gleeson, some comically inept villains and an off-kilter tone, which suggests folk songs and westerns. If Perrier’s Bounty and Jump hadn’t felt redundant and out of date before, they certainly do now. Furthermore, it all only goes to show how great In Bruges had been, that, despite all the typical trappings, it had succeeded in being thoroughly unique and subtly serious. Having said that, while Perrier’s Bounty, Jump and ultimately, despite it being a hit, The Guard are cinematic dead-ends, I Went Down deserves a bit of praise for being the first, for being funny and for not being hopelessly dated – after all, in 1997, I Went Down was only the Irish equivalent of a raft of American indie crime comedies all inspired by Tarantino. So while it isn’t groundbreaking in the same way that Rocky Road To Dublin and Poitín were/are, it was a welcome break from troubled history stories like the previous year’s Michael Collins, Some Mother’s Son and The Boxer. I Went Down shows Irish cinema trying to get away from The Troubles and become a part of the film movements of the time. Finally, Irish cinema was allowing itself to have fun.

Ultimately, the main appeal of I Went Down is that it is fun. The plot unravels well and the pace is quick, it doesn’t waste any time and it is consistently funny. Brendan Gleeson is always a joy to watch and though Peter MacDonald’s brand of doe-eyed naïveté never really caught on (see also When Brendan Met Trudy), it is endearing here. There is also a slightly serious undertone to the film in that Git is frequently worried that he is involved in something that might lead to murder. There is a certain morality at play here, which is too often missing in American or British gangster films that often mistake cruelty for cool. In keeping with this, nearly every character is given some sort of distinguishing characteristic or even a degree of likeability. This unwillingness to be cold-hearted adds to the fun, but it also ensures that you can watch I Went Down without getting a bad taste in your mouth. This lightness of touch feels distinctly Irish, as if the film is a bit of craic and anything too dark or violent will only ruin the fun. This is hardly a flawless framework for future films (witness I Went Down director Paddy Breathnach’s subsequent Man About Dog) but done well, it can work simple wonders.

As far as flaws go, there are few that matter – only the dull pair of female characters that the film itself can barely be bothered with (what else is new?) and an out of place conversation at the fade-out. This review will be shorter than usual because, simply, there isn’t much else to say about I Went Down other than to repeat that it is good, undemanding light entertainment.

REVIEW: Death of a Superhero (2012)

Death of a Superhero is a 2011-made Irish-German co-production, which never saw a cinematic release in Northern Ireland other than as part of the 12^th Belfast Film Festival – the same fate suffered by the much more dull Stella Days. Directed by Ian Fitzgibbon (Spin The Bottle, A Film With Me In It, Perrier’s Bounty) and a bit of a departure from crime comedies, Death of a Superhero is a sombre drama about a young man coming to terms with terminal illness, ineffective chemotherapy, terrified parents and girls.

Donald (Thomas Brodie-Sangster) is dying and though he tries to put up a front for his parents (Sharon Horgan – Run and Jump - and Michael McElhatton – November Afternoon, All Soul’s Day, I Went Down, Saltwater, Intermission, Adam and Paul, Mickybo and Me, Spin The Bottle, The Tiger’s Tail, Fifty Dead Men Walking, Perrier’s Bounty, Parked, Albert Nobbs, Shadow Dancer), inside he is wracked by thoughts of nihilism and suicide. A thanatologist cum therapist Dr. Adrian King (Andy Serkis) breaks through his defensiveness and they form a bond, which will ultimately give Donald a new outlook on life. At the same time, Dom falls for the rebellious Shelly (Aisling Loftus).

Donald is a talented animator and he has created a private, highly personal comic book world for himself, inhabited by a doomed superhero, that significantly reflects his own experiences. The film intercuts between live-action and animated sequences, the animations representing Donald’s thoughts and actions. Donald will often retreat to this animated world, although here his heroic counterpart is frequently seen restrained and under threat of imminent death. These sequences also feature a series of highly sexualised women, who represent Donald’s own burgeoning sexuality. Intimacy is something Donald has had little experience of and these fairly chauvinistic caricatures speak equally of his willingness to lose his virginity before he dies and his lack of experience with the opposite sex in real life. Shelly, calling his animations ‘porn’, will disrupt his ideas about women, though it leaves the film with a kind of Madonna-whore dichotomy that it never outgrows.

In summary, Death of a Superhero is a film about cancer and has all that can be expected from such a film. Its clichéd and a lot of what is done here has been done before but there are moments where a detectable sincerity and a willingness to tell the truth can manage to slip through. The performances are all very good with Horgan and McElhatton the most interesting as parents who cannot cope with what their son is going through. Serkis is good although in The Good Teacher role, which is as clichéd as anything but which somehow always manages to work – even when Adrian allows Donald to smash up his boat because it is therapeutic. Aisling Loftus is very good in a role that could have ruined the film – it remains a not very rewarding role but somehow Loftus, with her unpredictable performance, makes a lot out of it. The superhero stuff is silly but it is nonetheless a meaningful and useful way of getting inside Donald’s head, as well as a somewhat unique approach to a story like this.

Despite this, the film falls flat in the end. The typical sentimentality rears its head and though the film does pack an emotional weight, there is a sense of unreality and stupidity. Donald, of course, inspires everybody by the end. As soon as we see Adrian’s boat, abandoned in his front garden, we know that, by the end, he will be moved to take a sailing trip, probably after Donald has died. The sea plays a part in the end just like in a lot of Irish films about physical or emotional journeys – Lamb, Into The West, Disco Pigs and Dollhouse.

The animations end with ‘success through adversity’ in which the hero uses his very weakness to destroy his enemies, which says a lot about the message the film is trying to pander. It is of the ‘inspiration through illness’ malarkey, a difficult Hollywood message and one that Irish cinema would do well to get away from – My Left Foot is great despite it mainly because Christy Brown, as portrayed by Daniel Day-Lewis, was a much more ambiguous figure and because the film itself is very funny; Inside I’m Dancing, however, couldn’t come out from under its unbecoming sentimentality. Death of a Superhero comes somewhere in between – compassionate, likeable and by turns realistic but ultimately a little childish, a little too desperate for closure, for something good to come out of the story of a 15-year old terminal cancer patient.

Death of a Superhero, then, is a confident if traditional cancer story that doesn’t quite succeed in avoiding the trivialisation and sentimentalisation of its subject. Dr Adrian King feeling the need to sail away in his boat makes sense only because it has been done before, not because of anything to do with his character or the film’s storyline. It gets by mainly on the strength of its cast. 

See also: Perrier's Bounty

REVIEW: Perrier's Bounty (2009)

  This film comes with a lot of pedigree. Presumably coming off the back of the success of 2008 masterpiece ‘In Bruges’, with the director of ‘A Film With Me In It’ and the writer of ‘Intermission’ and starring Brendan Gleeson, Jim Broadbent, Cillian Murphy and Liam Cunningham, how could it be bad? Well…it isn’t. OK, it isn’t going to give the Irish film industry the kick up the backside that it needs, but it is a very funny 88 minutes and entertaining to beat the band.

  You are alerted to the film’s tone from the off, with a bouncy and colourful opening credit sequences and an introduction by a fun, cynical and annoyingly recognisable narrator. The story is that of a fairly conventional comedy thriller with a heavy dose of seedy locations and even seedier characters. Cillian Murphy’s Michael owes local gangster Perrier (the ever dependable Gleeson) money and has no way of getting it. Things get worse and worse until Michael is forced into hiding, taking suicidal neighbour Brenda (Jodie Whittaker of Venus fame) and dying estranged father (Broadbent) along with him. Perrier puts a bounty on their heads and the hunt is on. It may sound like something you’ve seen before, but the film’s humour raises it to a much higher level, allowing for some brilliantly unexpected little scenes, such as when Gleeson consoles a grieving henchman and when two wheel-clampers get in over their heads.

  The fun script is full of seedy characters spouting philosophical nonsense and tracts about non-existent codes of honour and even the Grim Reaper has a part to play. The characters are all very likable in the vein of Intermission’s multiple characters. Not one of them is innocent but fun performances and good scripting allow you to forget that. What’s great about the film is that it never gets too serious in an effort to be more than just a punchy comedy chase movie. Alongside the laughs, thrills and plentiful spills the film is a pseudo-profound mediation on something or other, which gives it a very enjoyable tongue in cheek feel but isn’t tackled seriously. Art this is not, and the film knows it. As the all-knowing narrator says, “Anyway…bit of craic, no?”