Venice at Home – Day 6: (A)Moral Tales
Tuesday, September 6, 2022 at 9:00AM 
Good news for Martin McDonagh fans - The Banshees of Inisherin is getting great reviews, marking a potential return to form after Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri proved to be a polarizing picture, regardless of its awards success. The new film reunites the Irish director with two of his favorite thespians, Brendan Gleeson and Colin Farrell. With another hit on his resume, the latter is having a marvelous year. Maybe that will materialize in Oscar buzz, or maybe not.
In contrast, Koji Fukada and his cast need not worry about such matters. The Japanese auteur rarely registers with voters beyond the festival circuit. Nevertheless, fans should be excited about Love Life, a family drama centering on a returning patriarch who brings with him much pain and guilt. Such aching themes are a constant in Martin McDonagh's cinema, too, featuring prominently in the first collaboration between the director, Farrell, and Gleeson. So let's remember that brilliant black comedy and one of Fukada's offbeat oddities…
IN BRUGES (2008)
How can one be anything but excited about another film centered around the dynamic between Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson? The Irish actors are two underrated marvels who're always up for a challenge, and together, they're positively miraculous. Look no further than In Bruges if you need proof of their smashing chemistry. Playing two hitmen stranded in Bruges awaiting orders from their bosses, they form an odd couple where the younger man is a miserable grump. Yet, at the same time, the older gentleman is pleased to indulge in touristic delights. Watching them wander through the picturesque Belgian city is a sweet study in contrasts, a loosely structured bit of camaraderie that stretches languidly through the film's first act.
Slowly, though, In Bruges starts to take shape, its humor giving way to bittersweet absurdity before a plunge into downright tragedy. Catholic guilt is an insidious force touching on all of McDonagh's characters, especially Farrell's remorseful Ray. Indeed, the motive for these two's continental exile is a messed-up job, whereupon the young hitman killed a kid by accident. Slaughtering a priest is no problem, but even organized crime has its taboos, moral limits, and codes of honor. To take a child's life is unforgivable, punishable by death. Not that Ray needs much aid – in one of his most harrowing scenes, the anguished Irishman puts a gun to his head in a playground.
A Beckettian duet of bored personalities reveals itself as a character study on the mindset of someone wracked by self-hate, brimming with admitted culpability and a heavy conscience that's like a noose around his neck. Some Fellini-like detours may pull the plot towards absurdism, but not even Ralph Fiennes' foul-mouthed angel of vengeance can distract from the delicate work done by McDonagh and his leads. As this director's movies grew in scope and success, becoming cynical to the point of glibness, In Bruges remains a perfect example of the equilibrium between writerly larks and dramatic depth. Not all of it works, that's true, but this vacation from hell is one entertaining trip through deliberate discomfort, full of riveting rapport, phenomenal performances.
You can rent In Bruges on various platforms, including Apple iTunes, Amazon Video, and Youtube.
A GIRL MISSING (2019)
Sometimes, all attempts at florid language or sophisticated writing are for naught, and the best way to describe a film is to be blunt about it. Koji Fukada's A Girl Missing is weird as fuck, which is a good thing, actually.
You wouldn't register the picture's oddity at first glance. Its form is surprisingly conventional, almost stale in its digital smoothness and rudimentary compositions. Only when a rupture in reality occurs, when dreams manifest, or information gets thrown out of order, does one realize how the unassuming style is an integral part of Fukada's ploy. By being presented the bizarre as if it was the most normal thing in the world, the audience's perception gets twisted out of shape. Nothing feels secure, and there's a sense anything could happen at any moment, reason and logic notwithstanding. When a plot can hinge on anecdotes shared between discussions of rhinoceros erections, mundanity is an illusion.
Indeed, much of A Girl Missing works as a dance between opposing ideas. There's a veneer of public propriety, a societal order that's so internalized no one even acknowledges its influence, its very existence. On the other hand, beneath the placidity of good manners, humanity lives in the shadows. Personhood is an animal behind bars where its idiosyncrasies can stay out of sight, where it can snarl and writhe while others pay it no mind. This paradigm is embodied by A Girl Missing's leading lady – the riveting Mariko Tsutsui. Whether crawling on all fours and barking like a dog, crying suddenly without explanation, or pondering dire retribution at the wheel, she's a fascinating figure.
Like her movie, Tsutsui's characterization is a puzzling mystery that systematically zigs when you expect it to zag. Because of that, I haven't revealed much about the script. Suffice it to say that it's a strange creation best appreciated with a fresh perspective and little in the way of expectations. So whatever you think you're getting out of A Girl Missing, you're mistaken.
A Girl Missing is currently streaming on the Criterion Channel, Vudu, Kanopy, Plex, AsianCrush, and Film Movement Plus.
What do you think is Colin Farrel's best screen performance? In Bruges or something else?
Reader Comments (3)
Wonderful write up as always Claudio. I have a question : do you think Gleeson will campaign in Lead or Supporting? It sounds like a two lead film .
I rewatched In Bruges with the boyfriend recently and it is still Farrell's best performance,the b/f loved it,is Gleeson this years veteran character actor in the supporting race when the more famous Colin goes lead.
I do love In Bruges including that scene where Ralph Fiennes and Brendan Gleeson have that meeting and they just curse at each other.