Every week, we in Her.ie towers will provide you with a blast from the past, a film that you cannot live without but nor should you, the classic film that you simply need to watch.
This week, given that his new film will be on screens tomorrow, we thought we would take a look at John Carney's Once.
Set in Dublin, Once certainly turned out to be the little film that could. Made on a shoestring budget (just €160,000) and starring a lot of their friends, John Carney and Glen Hansard teamed up for what most certainly seemed like a passion project. Well, that passion project struck gold and even took home that all important Oscar for Best Achievement in Music Written for Motion Pictures. On its release, it took the film world by storm and it's easy to see why, it charmed just about everybody.
Hansard plays Guy, a thirty something who spends most of his days and nights busking on Dublin's streets. When he's not crying out to the public with his guitar, he spends most of his time fixing vacuum cleaners for his father. However, everything changes when a girl happens across him on the street. Taken with his music, she becomes even more excited when she finds out that he can fix her broken vacuum cleaner.
After a short time together, the pair develop a beautiful friendship. It turns out that Girl can play the piano brilliantly and helps him out with tunes while Guy begins to find the stability he so craves after the departure of his girlfriend. Yet despite their close relationship, both parties know that this can never be and this sets everything up for a heartbreaking realization.
Once is so natural in its approach to the subject matter, you may actually begin to feel like you are just prying on two people's lives. Hansard and Marketa Irglova are just wonderful in their roles, along with some stunning musical numbers that will literally just take your breath away. If you don't feel a sob enveloping your throat during Leave, you don't have a heart. It will almost break you.
On top of that, Dublin is shown in all its honesty and all of its glory; there are some scenes where it is filmed so beautifully you may almost forget it is our capital city while Carney was still incredibly eager to show a heroin addict robbing Guy's busking takings for the day.
This is Irish cinema at its best, it's what we can do best. It just happens to break your heart at the same time. Dig it out, it's well worth a re-watch.
