SMALL THINGS LIKE THESE*****

Director Tim Mielants has delivered a quiet masterpiece in this film set in early 80s Ireland and based on the equally powerful, slippery novel by Clare Keegan with a screenplay by the writer Enda Walsh (HUNGER).

It stars Cillian Murphy (OPPENHEIMER) as Bill Furlong, the owner of a small coal business who is happily married and lives in a home filled with laughter and the tumbling chaos of a gaggle of daughters.  Nonetheless, as many who have scraped their way up from poverty, he can never quite shake off that feeling of insecurity and is haunted by memories of his childhood as an illegitimate child taken in by a kindly rich woman (Michelle Fairley - Game of Thrones).

The moral crisis of the film is triggered by Bill making a delivery to a convent himself, and seeing the exploitation of the girls there, and receiving a plea for help from one distraught teenager in particular. As viewers, we are sadly all too familiar with the decades-long abuses of the Magdalene Laundries, in which the Catholic Church exploited young pregnant women. The question is: what Bill will do?

As is made clear to him by the presiding Sister (Emily Watson - chilling), going against the Church means a kind of social ostracisation - and Bill has many girls to educate in the school that they run.  And yet, and yet, he all too well knows that his own mother might well have ended up in such an institution, had she not been taken care of by her kindly employer. 

The resulting film is beautifully acted and captures the claustrophobia and oppression of a small town suffocated by the Church.  The sound design is particularly notable for depicting the twin horrors breaking in on Bill's mind - of his childhood and what is happening in the convent. Just as with the novel, this is a movie that absolutely envelopes you in a certain time and place, and stirs up emotions and provokes moral questions. It is a thing of beauty and brilliance.

SMALL THINGS LIKE THESE is rated PG-13 and has a running time of 98 minutes. It played Berlin 2024 and was released in the USA and UK in November.

CLOSE***** - BFI London Film Festival 2022

Lukas Dhont (GIRL) returns to our screens with a devastatingly sad and beautifully observed story about the impact of homophobia on the friendship of two 13-year old boys in contemporary Belgium.  

As we meet them, Leo and Remi are as close and intimate as brothers, running and cycling free through fields of flowers. They feel innocent and pre-pubescent although I feel that Dhont's lensing points us to the idea that the way Leo looks at Remi is one of love and unacknowledged desire. 

This idyllic existence comes to an end of the first day of high school, when a girl observes their physical closeness and asks if they're a couple in a barrage of questions dripping in homophobia.  The fact that their relationship is not seen as normal or acceptable is emphasised by the schoolyard boys calling Leo a faggot and pansy. 

Although Remi is present at the conversation with the girls, their snide accusations seem to roll off of him. Maybe it's because he doesn't fully understand their meaning? Maybe he's just secure in what makes him happy - and that's just hanging out with Leo and playing the oboe. But Leo does react, angrily and vocally and physically, pushing Remi away from physical intimacy and learning to play ice hockey to become one of the cool, avowedly heteronormative boys. And yet, and yet, when he goes to see Remi at a concert, we still see his adoring glance. Remi, in his greater innocence, cannot fathom why his friend is pushing him away and his heart breaks.

The final hour of the film unfolds the consequences of heartbreak, with Leo, perhaps a self-hating, slowly realising that he is gay teen, coming to terms with his loss. In Lukas Dhont's delicate hands, this is all taken in delicate steps foregrounding Leo's further turn inwards, and his relationship with Remi's mother Sophie. It's fascinating to me that the adult men - Remi and Leo's fathers - are less present, but when they are, are vulnerable and anti-hetero-normative. 

This film is stunningly shot and beautifully acted. Credit to Dhont for uncovering and nurturing the talent of his two leads, Gustav de Waele (Remi) And Eden Dambrine (Leo). But special credit to Emilie Dequenne as Sophie. She deserves all the Best Supporting Actress awards that there are to give. 

CLOSE is rated PG-13 and has a running time of 105 minutes. Lukas Dhont won the Grand Prix at Cannes 2022. It also played Telluride and will play the BFI London Film Festival 2022.