John Carney’s Irish Once is a much more conventional musical film than we’ve been led to believe; it’s clever that Carney has called it “an art-house musical film,” but, generically, what the difference is between it and twentieth-century MGM musicals is impossible for me to determine. The fact that the film is shot in real-life locations, not sets, is irrelevant since Carney does everything he can to shoot these locations as though they were sets.
Although it thins out, the film is lovely for a spell, and certainly Glen Hansard’s music—Hansard also stars, as a Dublin busker who befriends a Czech immigrant—is gorgeous: pop/rock drawing its ache from a traditional Irish folk sound. However, everything that has to do with The Guy’s girlfriend, including flashbacks and the film’s ending, is dreadful. On the other hand, the father-son farewell is poignant. Once is an okay film that’s worth a look. Once. It’s worth a listen-to, though, more times than that.
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ONCE (John Carney, 2007)
John Carney’s Irish Once is a much more conventional musical film than we’ve been led to believe; it’s clever that Carney has called it “an art-house musical film,” but, generically, what the difference is between it and twentieth-century MGM musicals is impossible for me to determine. The fact that the film is shot in real-life locations, not sets, is irrelevant since Carney does everything he can to shoot these locations as though they were sets.
Although it thins out, the film is lovely for a spell, and certainly Glen Hansard’s music—Hansard also stars, as a Dublin busker who befriends a Czech immigrant—is gorgeous: pop/rock drawing its ache from a traditional Irish folk sound. However, everything that has to do with The Guy’s girlfriend, including flashbacks and the film’s ending, is dreadful. On the other hand, the father-son farewell is poignant.
Once is an okay film that’s worth a look. Once. It’s worth a listen-to, though, more times than that.
This entry was posted on December 19, 2007 at 5:07 pm and is filed under Informal Capsule Film Comments. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.