Maeve Higgins: Americans ask how real Banshees is, I say it was set long ago — the 1980s

Colin Farrell in the award-winning film ‘The Banshees of Inisherin’, where his eyebrows have competition in the furry stakes from his heralded co-star.

It was inevitable that I would see The Banshees of Inisherin. You will see it too. I resisted for as long as possible, which was almost three months.

Three months isn’t that long, I know. I’m weak, but in my defence, trying to ignore the latest Martin McDonagh film is like trying to resist the tide on a summer’s evening on Keem Bay. The waves of encouragement start small, but they’re insistent. In the beginning, your toes get wet, and it’s not unpleasant. Then the waves grow, and you decide to call it a day, but it’s too late; they pull you in. Before you know it, the tide has got you, and you find yourself sitting between your parents in a cinema in Midleton. It’s a cold and blustery night in the weird time between Christmas and New Year’s Eve, and you’re sharing a large popcorn and a bag of Minstrels, blended together as is tradition, and wondering, how did I end up here?

Months ago, a publicist for the film’s distribution company emailed asking if I’d like to go on a press trip to Ireland. Journalists in the US like myself were invited on a junket hosted by Tourism Ireland who were “looking to secure a film-specific travel feature on the locations the film was shot in, and/or a story on the culture or the production design amidst the beautiful Irish setting”.

Tourism Ireland’s whole mission is to market the island of Ireland overseas, so it makes sense. Journalists would see the film, then see Inis Mór, one of the islands that inspired the fictional island in the film. 

They would then rave about how beautiful it is, and Americans would book their flights, ferries, and motorised wheelchairs and go and see the place for themselves.

I didn’t take them up on the offer for a couple of reasons. One is obvious, I’m from Ireland and have been to Achill Island and Inis Mór, so I already know how special they are. Also, if I went home and didn’t go to Cobh, where I’m from, the family-wide Higgins alarm would go off, and I would be in deep, lasting trouble.

Colin Farrell in ‘The Banshees of Inisherin’.

Another reason is more professional than fear of Higgins retribution. I knew that if the good people at Tourism Ireland brought me on a lovely trip, I’d be obliged to write something that advertised the film and said it was good, and I’d have to promise to do that before I even saw the film. Weeks later, a different publicist contacted me to go and see a special showing in New York, with a Q+A afterward with the director and male stars. It was a busy time with many other deadlines, and I couldn’t make it.

Then I went home for Christmas, and my parents suggested we go and see it. They had not been to the cinema in years. They told me there was a donkey in it. I relented. I watched The Banshees of Inisherin just as fate dictated I must. So, is it a good film? An insane question, of course, when this is a work of art we are dealing with! Art is subjective; who are we to say what is good? Films are a massive group project, a collaborative tightrope, so much easier to get wrong than right! Is it good? How dare I, squashed between Mammy and Daddy, deign to sit in judgement of these giants of cinema?

OK, but…is it good, though?

My infuriating hedging should tell you a lot. Yes, of course, it’s good, that’s one answer. How couldn’t it be good, with a celebrated writer and director and colossal movie stars and all the support of the entire industry? Lots of parts of it are good, and those are the parts I will focus on. Not because my country literally asked me to, but because I know how difficult it is to make something good, even with (here I can only imagine) every advantage and all the money, goodwill, and high expectations in the world.

First of all, the film is beautiful. I’m telling you, it’s absolutely gorgeous to look at. 

Like a painting! And the acting is excellent, top-drawer stuff. My favourite part is that, for once, there is something more expressive, more furry, and more adorable on screen than Colin Farrell’s eyebrows. That is the donkey, an absolutely incredible miniature donkey who plays herself in several scenes and steals each one.

Colin Farrell and Martin McDonagh pose in the press room during the 80th Annual Golden Globe Awards at The Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills, California.

There were a couple of not-so-good parts. I didn’t laugh a lot. The film is marketed (and as mentioned, this film is marketed harder than most) as a comedy. 

There are some mildly funny parts, but it’s not a comedy. I understand that. Comedies are much more challenging to make than dramas. 

Besides, if it were a comedy, it wouldn’t be so highly praised by reviewers and other film people, and it probably wouldn’t win as many prizes as it’s about to. Also, it’s tiring but valid to point out that there are barely any women; there are just men, men, men everywhere. There is one woman, the great Kerry Condon, and one old crone with, as far as I recall, no lines. But still, she counts! Mainly it’s various generations of men having all kinds of experiences on screen and generally exploring what it means to be alive, which is fine.

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Still, after decades of Irish films doing this, I can’t help being bored of it. Some Irish people complain that the film portrays Ireland as twee and backward. When Americans watch it and are charmed by the cottages and oil lamps and Irish men’s inability to express emotions except through violence, and they ask me how real it is, I tell them it was set a long time ago, in the 1980s. In any case, I don’t particularly want Brendan Gleeson and the lads to punch each other outside a Starbucks or fume silently in their cubicles at their UX design jobs in the Amazon offices.

It is what it is, a first-generation immigrant’s impression of a place that never really existed. From the beginning of his career to now, that is what Martin McDonagh makes his art from.

So, will you see this film? In summary, you will, and more than that, you will see this film turn into the inevitable juggernaut it was made to be.