THE QUIET GIRL*****

As easy as it is to be cynical about awards season hoopla, it is a marvel that such a nakedly commercial enterprise still manages to shine a light on small independent films like this.  One gasps at the assured storytelling of first time feature director-writer Colm Bairead.  This isn't the only similarity THE QUIET GIRL shares with another astonishing and Oscar-nominated first feature, AFTERSUN.  Both films have a willingness to tell a profound emotional story in which nothing and everything happens - films in which love and grief and melancholy suffuse the atmosphere, and in which we focus on an earnest story about fathers and daughters.

THE QUIET GIRL is based upon a short story by Claire Keegan, whose Small Things Like These was my pick of the Booker Prize longlist last year.  That title would as well fit this story.  As it opens, we see a young, sensitive, quiet girl called Cait stuck in a noisy, violent, dark, chaotic, cramped house full of unwanted children, a pregnant mother and an alcoholic father. Seemingly arbitrarily, Cait is chosen to go and live with the mother's childless and older relatives who live in a modest but well-ordered working farm. The contrast is stark.  Eibhlín and Sean are emotionally worn but kind and caring, even if it takes Sean a while to learn how to warm up.  They are nurturing and proud and appreciate her quiet self-restraint.  Over the course of the film we come to find out the reason for their melancholy and see the sparks of hope and love that this relationship gives them and Cait. By the end of the film I felt utterly invested in their future and profoundly moved. 

All this is testament to the restrained and nuanced performances from the three leads - newcomer Catherine Clinch as Cait and Carrie Crowley and Andrew Bennett as her foster parents. It's also testament to the way in which Bairead and DP Kate McCullough choose to frame action within early 80s Ireland's cramped rooms that seem to contain a thousand emotions.  The choice of Academy ratio really works here. 

THE QUIET GIRL is rated PG-13 and has a running time of 94 minutes. It played Berlin 2022 and was released last year in the USA and UK. It is nominated for the Best Foreign Language film Oscar. 

THE LITTLE STRANGER - Crimbo Binge-watch #7

Lenny Abrahamson (ROOM) returns to our screens with another film based on a prize winning book - this time the slow-burn period haunted house story THE LITTLE STRANGER by Sarah Waters. The adaptation is faithful and so shares the books strengths and weaknesses.  Its strength is its evocation of post-war England in which the great estates are being bankrupted and social change is afoot. Our protagonist is a doctor (Domnhall Gleeson - Star Wars' Hux), soon to become part of the NHS. He still resents the fact that his mother worked herself to the bone in a grand country house, and while he ingratiates himself with the family carries a working class chip on his shoulder.  The grand family hard on its luck are made up of a still grand mother (Charlotte Rampling), a brutally war-injured son (Will Poulter - superb in a "posh" character role), and Ruth Wilson who as ever seems to be operating on a far higher emotional level than the other actors she's working with.  She's really the focus of our attention - a woman who is clever and capable but is stuck trying to keep the family together against financial ruin and now - apparently - spooky goings on.  I also love the theme that Sarah Waters often explores of how women, no matter how smart, are often under-estimated, unheard, or worse wilfully disbelieved simply because of their gender. 

What I like about the film is its patient slow build, but I can see why this might frustrate fans of more pacy and punchy horror. After all, I am a notorious coward when it comes to watching horror so if I can get through the film you know it's not really that scary - more of an emotional exploration of the history that is haunting the family.

THE LITTLE STRANGER is rated R and has a running time of 111 minutes. It was released earlier this year. 

ROOM - BFI London Film Festival 2015 - Day Five

You can listen to a podcast review of this film here or subscribe to Bina007 Movie Reviews in iTunes.

Sometimes the best films have the shortest reviews because they set out to do something very specific and do it very simply and very well, with any pyrotechnics or flashiness: just creating writing and acting.  The writing is down to Emma Donoghue, who has adapted her own best-selling novel for the screen in this faithful and deeply affecting drama.  The story is told from the perspective of a bright young five year old boy called Jack, who with his mother is imprisoned in a suburban garden shed by their abusive captor, Old Nick.  The first half of the book and film sees us grow in admiration for Ma, and the clever way in which she tries to keep her son educated, well nourished and safe against all odds. Their is a pivotal point in the book which I won't reveal here, and after that both mother and son face even greater challenges that echo and comment upon the earlier ones.  

The amazing thing about the book was Donoghue's ability to put us convincingly and firmly in the mind of a small boy in an unthinkable situation, and the movie successfully manages to bring this to the screen. Director Lenny Abrahamson (FRANK) uses the camera imaginatively to render a child’s eye view of the world and it’s testament to his skill that although most people watching this movie will know exactly how it turns out, the escape plot is incredibly tense. But the reason why this film is as emotionally affecting as it is, is down to the performances of the two lead actors. Brie Larson has always been impressive, not least in SHORT TERM 12, but her evident rapport with Jacob Tremblay, who plays Jack means that every scene is laden with emotional impact. I defy anyone to watch it without tearing up at several points during the narrative.  

Sometimes the best movies are simple in their concept.  A moving story well acted.  Sometimes you just have to stand back and watch talent at work.

ROOM has a running time of 118 minutes and is rated R.  The film played Telluride, Toronto and London 2015 and will be released in the USA on October 16th and in the UK on January 29th.