So on our DirecTV they have this channel called “REELS” It’s basically like watching a 24 hour previews channel (they do fit in other stuff there as well, but it seems mostly previews). We saw a preview for In Bruges a few weeks back. It looked like a drama mixed with a pretty fun dark comedy.
It’s about 2 hit men who, after a botched job, get sent to Bruges belgium to hide out. One of them is enchanted and wants to go sight seeing, one is less than thrilled at this quiet little town. It follows them through their trying to cope with being stuck there with no real idea as to why as well as coping with the job gone wrong and a reexamining of themselves.
The previews, as they often do, set improper expectations. I loved the movie, it did have some great comedicparts. The drama was much more pronounced than the trailer let on. Very well acted, well written, even well shot. However going in my wife was not prepared for the very detailed effects of the gun violence. She’s a bit squamish and it was a bit over the top for her.
If you don’t mind some pretty gory gunshot scenes I highly reccommend it.
Yep, I agree. I saw it several weeks ago at a free preview screening (I kept forgetting to post about it) and the director was there for a question and answer session. I liked it so much I paid to see it again when it opened. The comedic parts were enjoyable, but it was, as you say, much more serious than I expected going in. A nice mix, I thought.
Even though the Colin Ferrell character kept calling the town a “shithole” the movie made me want to visit Bruges. The director said he screened it for the big shots of Bruges and they all seemed to like it. It was pretty obvious in the movie that Ferrell’s character was an ass (a funny and poignant ass, but an ass nonetheless) and was dead wrong about the town.
Ha, that someone would call Bruges, of all places, a shithole is kind of funny in itself. It’s an absolutely gorgeous town and would be much better without all the other. . . people there. I’m looking forward to seeing this just for the scenery.
Just saw this today, Thank you for the Presidents’ Day Holiday. What a great mix of comedy and drama. There are too many great lines to quote. It may have helped that my mother was born in Belgium and Bruges (or Brugge as we call it in Flemish) is one of my favorite places ever. With any luck we pushed this over the $500,000 dollar mark. That’s really sad, a movie this great, and showing on just two screens in the entire DC area is getting no press.
I’ve been there a few times, and if you like “quaint”, this is your place. Just call it Brugge (Broo-guh, roughly), though, since it’s in the Flemish part and Bruges is the French version.
Himself & I went to see it this past weekend as part of our belated Valentine’s Day celebration. Fabulous movie - I agree that the trailers don’t emphasize the drama enough, but I thought the acting was marvelous.
I also liked the side note of three different Harry Potter actors in the film, but maybe that’s just me.
We hope it opens here. Ebert loved it. The wife popped down to Bruges and had a nice weekend there one year when she was staying in the Netherlands because of a project she was in charge of. She loved the place. Have not been there myself.
The director said that oddly enough it was the first movie ever made in Bruges. He’d been there, fell in love, and wanted to showcase it. Yeah, Ferrell’s continued petulance at being stuck in a small town, and nastiness toward the place just because it wasn’t London was funny, because it was clear to everyone but him that the place was like a fuckin’ fairy tale (film reference).
And yeah Indyellen, the director joked that he got a lot of (good-natured ribbing) grief over it being a “Harry Potter reunion” with Brendan “Mad-Eye Moody” Gleeson, Ralph “Voldemort” Feinnes, and Clémence “Fleur Delacour” Poésy.
John Mace, it wasn’t explained why they chose that spelling. Maybe it looked better on the posters. I’m a big city girl but I’m always up for some quaint. Not that I’ll ever make it to Belgium or anything, but if I were ever nearby, I’d go there.
I hadn’t heard of the director before, but apparently he’s quite a big name as a playwright. His name is Martin McDonagh and this was his first feature film, though he won an Academy Award in 2006 for his Live Action Short film Six Shooter (wow, see, people who win those things DO sometimes go on to bigger things!). He was very personable and I’m glad I got to meet him.
I didn’t because I haven’t seen that, but I noticed him right away as [spoiler]Fletcher Hamilton from There Will Be Blood. Also, Carl from Munich, Lord Tarlton from Amazing Grace, Herod from The Nativity Story, and Dick Koosman from Margot At The Wedding. Ciarán Hinds was also in Road to Perdition, Veronica Guerin , The Sum of All Fears, Phantom of the Opera and Calendar Girls, among many other things. He’ll also be in the upcoming Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day with Amy Adams and Frances McDormand. He’s one of those actors who’ve been around for ages but we’re (I’m) just now noticing him.
It was funny that his role in In Bruge was so small, but no one thought to ask the director if there were deleted scenes with more of him (at IMDB he’s listed as “uncredited” for In Bruges). Btw, it wasn’t spelled out but it seemed clear to me that the priest was killed because he had sexually abused Harry (Ralph Feinnes) as an altar boy. Did anyone else pick up on that?[/spoiler]
Siam Sam, glad to hear that Ebert loved it. I’ll have to go read his review now.
Well, that’s the English word for the city-- not surprising since we usually go with the French version of city names. I was just pointing out that if you go there, the locals (mostly Flemish, Dutch speakers) will appreciate it if you call it by it’s Flemish name.
Locally it sounds more like “Bruh-hah” (a west Flemish thing-- always sounds like Praha to me), elsewhere in Flanders it’s like “BROOch-khuh” (a light “khuh” as in challah bread, while up in the Netherlands it’s much harder, like a cat-strangling sound) but more a ‘ch’ (like in loch) than anything else.
I just got back from this now. I wanted to see it because I just finished reading “The Beauty Queen of Leenane” by McDonagh. This is the best movie I have seen in a very long time and I’m quite happy I didn’t wait for it to come out on DVD. Now I’m trying to think of friends who I can drag to see it - the ones who would appreciate the dialog and themes would hate the violence and vice versa. Of course, the former wouldn’t be the same without the latter. I’m planning on spending the rest of the week reading the rest of his plays - very glad I picked up the anthology. One of the characters from “Leenane” is also named Ray, so I’m wondering if there’s some sort of a connection between the two works.
I think the important thing is not whether he lives or dies, but the fact that he wants to live. The uncertainty at the end is one of the things I liked most about this film. No clear cut happy ending, but rather a sort of grim and desperate hope that maybe things will work out eventually. If Ray had just managed to find some way to beat Harry and walked off smiling into the sunset with Chloe it would have been too Hollywood and would have ruined the film, IMO.