52. The Banshees of Inisherin

 

This movie was so fucking tragic.

It was a masterpiece, don't get me wrong, but it turned into such a hideous, heartbreaking film toward the end that I want to avoid it for the rest of my life.

Now I love Brendan Gleeson, and that isn't just because I have a crush on Domhnall Gleeson, and I also love Colin Farrell. Their movies are great both together and alone, and the talent they showed in this movie. God damn. But what the actual fuck, who gave them the right to make me weep? Not at them though. No. Let me explain...

I wouldn't say that I am an over-sensitive lass, but the deaths/murders/manslaughter of animals especially on screen does upset me an awful lot. That of course was the point of this movie, to shock and upset you, but I didn't realise the lengths these two Irish fellas were going to go to in order to upset each other. 

The film follows two supposed best friends, Padraic and Colm (apologies I can't figure out how to do the special characters in the first name but just know that Padraic is spelt slightly different and pronounced different too). We enter this story just as Colm decides he doesn't like Padraic anymore and no longer wishes to be his friend. These are men of routine, this is unusual. He says this is on the basis of his former friend being so dull, and that he realised his life has simply drifted away from him. He wishes to be remembered through his music and is in a rush to create that very marker, but what Colm forgets is that he can also be remembered through his friends and by pushing what is effectively his only one away he has lost his chance.

Just while we are on this point actually, I think Colm realises this, but he is too stubborn to back down and not finish what he has started. He realises that on that little island there is fat chance of being remarkable through his fiddle playing and it's too late to back down on the rift he has created, so he plays on his threat of chopping off his fingers every time Padraic talks to him. This way he is remembered no matter what, for the wrong reasons I grant you but he will certainly be remembered. 

This fear of being forgotten is a very real one, to the point whole traditions (think Day of the Dead) are built around it. This fear has clearly driven an old man mad, and what happens later in the film sure seems to shock him out of it. But by then it is far too late.

Anyway, this not talking to his best mate thing is causing a bit of a stir, and Padraic can't seem to let it go. I mean he is understandably hurt. His friend won't talk to him anymore with no good reason and it drives him a little batty too. This film could have been heavily influenced by covid as a lot of peeps went crazy due to that isolation, this was on a small Irish island miles from anywhere, that's a whole different sort of isolation. But what took the biscuit was Colm cutting off his fingers, starting with his fiddle hand, every time Padraic approached him. Through doing this he shocked the island, not least of all Padraic, but that didn't seem to knock any sense into him. A cruel half trick on Colm's part (not trick I spose but he didn't correct Padraic when he thought they were going back to be friends) resulted in him hacking off the remaining fingers on his hand, and once thrown upon the door of his ex-friend were consumed by Padraic's little donkey. Unfortunately, the members caused the wee thing to choke to death. Having lost his sister to the mainland, his best friend through stupidity, and now his little donkey, Padraic changes drastically and burns Colm's house down. Colm asks if this makes them even, Padraic replying the only way they would have been even were if Colm had stayed in the house when it burned. We finish the movie with Padraic writing to his sister pretending everything is okay, aside from the news that Dominic was found drowned in the lake- probably the most tragic thing in this movie aside from the donkey's death. 

Let me talk about poor Dominic a moment. 

Dominic was left to live with his abusive policeman father. He was known as the island idiot but no one seemed to realise that the reason he was a little perverted and daft is because of all the things his father did to him. As an officer of the law no one thought to question it, but the poor lad had no boundaries because none were taught to him, his were just crossed.

When Padraic lost Colm he turned to Dominic out of pure desperation more than anything else- to the point that in order to steal some Potcheen (I cannae be bothered to spell it in Irish to be misunderstood) he is forced to confront Dominic's terrible secret, he then lets the boy stay with him and his sister. Dominic experiences the first kindness I expect in a long time and not long after approaches Siobhan (Padraic's sister) and asks if she could love someone like him. She politely declines and of course a little later moves to the mainland. Now we haven't seen Dominic since he asked her out on the edge of the lake, it isn't until the end of the movie he is found dead. Padraig assumed he had slipped and fallen in, he writes it so to Siobhan, but I don't think that was the case. I think after being beaten black and blue by his father with a bloody kettle, and being rejected by the only woman who showed him an ounce of kindness, he had enough sense left in him just to end it all. That hit me real hard. Poor, poor Dominic. His death was meant to be the last punch in the gut from this melancholy movie.

Hats off to Barry Keoghan who seems to be able to play a mentally ill character very well.

This movie had a pure sense of innocence about it in a way. I think that's what made it so horrific. At the end of the day the theme here is loneliness.

Colm is lonely in the way that he has no family to survive him and continue on his memory, so he's done something drastic instead.

Padraic is lonely in the physical sense, he's lost his friend, his sister has moved away, the only other man who would spend time with him has now died and his wee donkey is dead too. He's all alone in his little old house with a routine that was made for more than one.

Siobhan is lonely too. Everyone comments on how she went unmarried, she jumped at the chance to get away. Siobhan had her brother but she was lonely in romance and mind. If Colm wasn't such a knob perhaps they could have been in love.

Dominic is lonely in secrets. He had nowhere to turn to, no one to run to. His daddy was beating him and worse and he was all alone with the knowledge. No one was around to stop it until it was too late. Dominic was just alone and tortured because of it. 

The Banshees of Inisherin is a brilliant film. Truly. It is haunting, tragic even, and I fully support the fact it deserves an award. So much praise needs to go out there about this film, the acting was impeccable. Really sold the feel of it. But in no fucking way was this a comedy. It was listed as a drama/comedy and that couldn't have been further from the fucking truth.

I thought I was in for some tormented souls and black laughs. No. I was in for tormented souls and heartbreak. The banter was funny between friends when it was so, the rest was bleak as fuck.

I give The Banshees of Inisherin a 7/10. I'm sorry but I can't get past the wee donkey. I would have killed Colm there and then, let alone been as calm as Padraic as he threatened him. That was certainly the moment Colm realised he'd gone too far. Tough shit. 

This is the moment I'd ask you to drop a comment so we can talk about it. In this instance please don't, I don't want to talk about this movie anymore, it makes me sad.