Here's the round up of scores:
Cinematography: 5/5
Storytelling: 4/5
Acting: 5/5
Entertainment: 3/5
Production Design: 4.5/5
Short review: Boasting some of the most beautiful layered landscapes caught on this side of 21st century filmmaking, The Banshees of Inshiren is seductively complex film beneath it's almost charming tale of two friends when one of them suddenly ends their friendship.
I have always enjoyed Martin McDonaugh's works, In Bruges and Three Billboards are some of my fav comedy drama-thrillers out there and while Banshees does lack a bit of dramatic flair of its predecessors (think of that one-shit sequence in Three Billboards or the final scene of In Bruges), what's here is more refined and tightly woven together, every scene says something about the characters and there's a sense of something ominous going on that's outside of the control of our main characters which adds another dimension of tension into the story that's already building sort of this gritty tense standoff that refuses to resolve itself.
I had a chance to watch the deleted scenes of the film as they were included on Disney+, more films need to do that btw, and I was surprised by how conscious some of those decisions must have been. Every deleted scene adds a new dimension to the character and you can tell that Martin maybe didn't want to show off that side of the character whether it be Padraic's (Farrel) insensitive to his sister's crying or Colm's inability to play out a tone and his frustration following that.
Anyway, I think it's a brilliant grand film. One that looks beautiful and vast while telling a very small but relatable story, all the while taking out the time to show the lives of other characters.
you're right in saying that it's just one reading of the film because while I don't really know or care about the Irish Civil War (much like the characters haha) I still think it was a little fitting that there's a whole struggle going on in the mainland that acts as background scenery for the main film. I think that was a really pretty choice, could they have done more to show the ramifications of those background events? sure and felt like that little bit was lacking from Siobhan's story after she moves to the mainland but that's my only minor problem with it
i mean, the final scene kinda seals it for me as valid reading, the no coming back from line, the existence of some explosions before could be hand waived away as setting, but not the last scene.
well yeah, i count entertainment as not having once checked the watch or the progress bar, which this film fulfilled. cause taking it as being mesmerized by pretty colors would just mean light cgi spectacles.
I did check the time....
smh at millenials. it's fine, i was bored out of my mind by uncut gems, which people keep selling as this gripping ride, so
I was gripped in Sentimental Values and thought Heat was a little dull, we all have our preferences