My wife generally likes to watch many of the Oscar nominated films, so she brought this film home from the library. Her impression was that it was a humorous film about friendship.
Are any of you willing to explain what we watched? I know it was rated R, but I almost think it should have had a warning for “disturbing/grotesque content.” There were a couple of amusing lines, and I guess it involved friendship, but we were confused and somewhat disturbed by what we watched.
Looking after, I see the writer/director did 3 Billboards and In Bruges. I really likes Billboards. I know some folk here LOVE Bruges; I thought it started off interesting, but I lost interest in the 2d half.
Banshees was cool in the way it created Ireland of a century ago. And my wife and I LOVE Irish fiddle music. But we DEFINITELY coulda done w/o the mutilation.
Oh, you didn’t miss anything. Yes, it started off humorous, or seemingly so, in that harsh and brutal way the Irish do so well. But then it just got insane and bleak, with no dividing line to tell you things just got serious. That was the intent I think - how far will these two take it? Too far!
Another Irish film that takes this approach is The Butcher Boy, from 1997. Almost a rebuttal to those films where some wacky kid breaks all the rules and gets away with it because he’s such an irrepressible scamp.
On reflection, I really don’t see the point of it. Most films have some kind of theme or controlling idea, and this one didn’t really leave me with anything to chew on. The guy who lopped off his fingers was pretty clearly suffering from some kind of mental illness, so what is the takeaway, other than “Crazy people do crazy shit and ruin everything?”
I give it credit for being relatable, and well-acted, and funny and surprising. And I can see the possibility there of some kind of Irish allegory. It’s interesting to me that the other people in the village didn’t try to intervene in the madness. In truth, there is a lot that is interesting about the film.
I just don’t know what the director was trying to tell me.
I liked it (watched it twice) and understood the point of it. I tend to watch movies I like multiple times since I know what’s going to happen I can pick up things early in the film that are related to what happens later.
I loved it. It was one of the more hilarious films I’ve seen in a long time. I really liked the second half as well, especially when Colm lives up to his ridiculous threat.
It seemed to me that the point was a bit of a ham-fisted commentary on the Irish Civil War (which they mentioned a time or two during the movie, especially though at the end) - through their in-fighting they end up really destroying themselves. I believe more people were killed in the Irish Civil War than in the Irish War of Independance that preceded it and the economic costs were pretty high as well.
Oh, I followed the allegory for the most part, but it confused me because the nature of the rupture in the friendship seemed so arbitrary. I’m not sure what that correlates to in the Civil War, but maybe that is the point of it being arbitrary.
If the message was, “Infighting leads to the destruction of relationships,” then… Isn’t that a tautology? It’s not like the whole village was destroyed.
It’s like the story didn’t stand on its own because the character actions were inexplicable (he wants time to create art, then cuts off his fingers so he can’t create art anymore… So what does he actually want?)
But it made for a tortured allegory as well, because I don’t see how you can extrapolate the nature of that rupture to historical events. But I don’t know much at all about the Irish Civil War so maybe I’m missing a lot.
Don’t get me wrong, I think it’s a better film than probably 80% of other films out there.
But a little more clarity would have elevated it from good to great.
I find a lot of broken friendships to end on something absolutely nonsensical. Colm’s stated purpose was that Padriac was too dull and he wanted to spend his time doing things that will really matter. I’ve seen friendships end for more non-sensical things than that. Usually in most cases the spurned friend may try to figure out what’s going on but ultimately both accept the new state of affairs. This being a Martin McDonough film, things aren’t that simple and both sides end up not letting things go and suffering as a result. Colm cuts off his fingers to make Padraic feel so bad that he’ll stop talking to Colm, which is ridiculous but hilariously so. The inexplicability made it even more hilarious, IMO.
The basic jist of the Irish Civil War is that the victorious factions in the Irish War for Independance rupture over the treaty that is to be signed with the UK. After 10 months of war, killing a lot of leaders in Ireland, the anti-treaty forces surrender. So a whole lot of war for nothing. And the anti-treaty and pro-treaty factions basically become the biggest political parties in Ireland and all like bitter spurned ex-friends for decades.
If it’s an allegory for the Irish Civil war, it’s simplistic and vague. If it’s not, then it has no point, a lot of gabber and dithering over not very much. Two friends stop talking–there, I’ve spoiled the film for you.
I tend to appreciate a lot of black comedy, but I found the cutting off of the fingers and the burning of the house gruesome and disturbing. Then add in the extremely bothersome cop, and the abused simpleton who kills himself.
There were occasional good lines - as a banjo picker myself I like the line that he could play it after cutting off a finger. And the priest shouting that Colm was fucked.
I’m just not sure what would have been “hilarious.”
I fell off my couch laughing when Colm throws his finger at the door. He actually did it… the absurdity of it. And then when Padraic tells Colm he’s going to burn his house, but please put the dog out because the dog didn’t do anything to him. Colm then later thanks Padraic for taking care of the dog. And most of the scenes with Mrs. McCormick was pretty amusing (Padraic hiding behind the stone wall was pretty good). And when Padraic tells the fiddler student how he has to rush home (and that the student he had another family member who was hit by a bread truck).
I thought the entire thing was a very humorous dark comedy.
It’s not a movie created for easy takeaways or categorization. I truly enjoyed it. I always appreciate when a movie introduces me to people I like and then twists my guts as they do less and less likeable things.
One aspect that stuck with me: Relationships evolve, and sometimes we end up not liking people we spend a lot of time with. It takes a lot of strength to acknowledge this, and even more to do something about it. If you’re married, there’s always divorce. But what if that person is a friend? How far would you go to sever that person from your life?
I wasn’t expecting to like it. I hated Billboards and couldn’t even finish Bruges. I wouldn’t say I found it FUNNY or maybe even that I liked it? But it was very good. Very compelling.
I am not Irish, but Irish-American (with some stray accents still floating around our family reunions). I found it so familiar, the sulking, the aggressive over-reaction, the desperate fawning for attention. Or maybe that has nothing to do with Irish people and just people. Maybe it felt closer to home because of the accents. Although it feels like my other family’s branches of non-Irish would have hurt someone else, not themselves? In my Irish family self-destructive spite is clearly on the dominant genes.
I liked it more for watching Colin Farrell & Brendan Gleason sharing film space again more than anything else. I adore In Bruges and I have a (admittedly silly) idea that Colm & Padraic were reincarnated as Ken & Ray. I am not sure I would have liked it as well if it had different leads but I did enjoy it enough to watch it twice . I do love dark comedy so I wasn’t too bothered by the gruesome aspects though as a life long horse owner, I highly doubt the likelihood of the donkey’s demise.
It’s an allegory for the Irish Civil War. Like the feud between these two friends, the war was futile and caused nothing but suffering for everyone involved. Where once they were like brothers, the two men find themselves on opposing sides for reasons that don’t quite make sense to either of them.
