The Banshees of Inesherin

 3.5/4

Starring: Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson, Kerry Condon, Barry Keoghan

Rated R for Language Throughout, Some Violent Content and Brief Graphic Nudity

People like change only when it's on their terms.  When a person finally gets to buy a car they've had their eye on for months, it's thrilling.  When they have to buy a car because someone else crashed into it, it's a pain in the ass.  Of course, life supplies everyone with both types of change.  For better and for worse.

For Padriac Suilleabhain (Farrell), life doesn't change much.  He lives with his sister Siobhan (Condon), his animals including his beloved donkey Jenny, and his daily ritual of sharing a few pints with his friend, Colm Doherty (Gleeson).  Then one day Colm drops a bombshell: he doesn't want to speak to Padriac anymore.  Padriac is taken aback, but Colm finds him a bore and wants to concentrate on writing music.  Now what?

Other than the quality of the writing and acting, writer/director Martin McDonagh's most impressive accomplishment is that he successfully skates the line between comedy and tragedy.  "The Banshees of Inisherin" is funny, but it also generates a considerable amount of pathos.  Often at the same time.  This is difficult to do, with films usually falling on one side or the other.  I find this particularly true of arthouse films or so-called "classics."  As if a film is in a foreign language or has a pipe smoking hipster at the helm, inhuman cruelty automatically becomes hilarious.  Martin McDonogh does not have that problem. He found the correct balance in his acclaimed 2017 film "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri," and he does it again here.  What's more, he hits the target at a considerably higher rate.

Of course it helps that he has a top flight cast working for him.  Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson are two of Ireland's finest character actors, and neither Kerry Condon nor Barry Keoghan strike a false note.  Three of them have worked with McDonagh before: Farrell and Gleeson in "In Bruges" (where they also had the lead), and Condon had a supporting role in "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri."  Barry Keoghan is a newbie to the team, but he fits right in.

It's refreshing to watch a movie where the screenplay is brightly written and intelligent.  Too often movies are bogged down by cliches, fan service and obvious subtext.  There's nothing like that here.  In fact, "The Banshees of Inesherin" is like a filmed version of a play, with none of the drawbacks.  Padriac, Colm, and everyone else feel like real people, not stock characters from the Old Writer's Home.  This isn't "August: Osage County."

"The Banshees of Inesherin" is difficult to market.  After all, this isn't the kind of premise that will draw in audiences.  It relies on word of mouth, and Searchlight Pictures has done an amazing job of generating that.  For once, the little indie that could is worthy of the hype that it has gotten.  It's too soon to tell whether or not Farrell, Gleeson or Condon will get Oscar nods, although it would be naive to believe that isn't the distributor's hope.  Too much depends on politics and its competition.  If they do, it will be deserved.

This is the kind of movie adults pray they get every fall.  It's smart, well-acted, and doesn't have any of the trappings that befall too many would-be auteurs.  Don't wait for it to come to streaming.  It's good enough to take a trip to the theaters to see.