Film industry - The Guard’s early success

THE Irish movie, The Guard, opened last Friday in New York and Los Angeles, and has already taken those cities by storm, with its gross earnings making it the second highest earner per screen over the weekend. Now it is being extended to 50 other cities.

The early reviews have been encouraging. “The Guard is not a breath but a great gust of very funny fresh air,” Kenneth Turan wrote in the Los Angeles Times. He was particularly impressed by Brendan Gleeson as an “unconventional Irish police sergeant giving conniptions to a by-the-book American FBI agent coolly played by Don Cheadle”.

There is a sense of the old meeting the new for the Americans, for whom the movie cop on the beat was often the expatriate Irishman. This is a story of the refined FBI agent working with the “real Irish cop” in Co Galway.

Brendan Gleeson is best known to Americans for his small role in the Harry Potter series, according to the New York Daily News. “That’s a shame, given his ability to take over the screen,” the newspaper’s critic wrote. “So grab this opportunity to discover his outsize talent, if you haven’t yet.”

“Popping with glorious, bright colour and off-colour jokes,” the New York Times observed, “Mr Gleeson’s rogue is a treat, however conceptually contrived, and Mr Cheadle’s lightly played gravity is a pleasure.”

Within the English-speaking world, Ireland has long been famous for its writers and sense of humour, so it refreshing to witness the success of The Guard, and the hope that it could give a boost to both the country and the struggling Irish film and tourist industries.