![\"Banshees](\"http:\/\/www.cyram.org\/cribeerion\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/banshee-1024x683.jpg\")
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The Banshees of Inisherin is a dark comedy, detailing loneliness, depression, isolation, and broken friendships. A lot of the film is about how the two main characters, Colm and Padraic, handle their depression and isolation…badly.<\/p>\n
A lot of the characters’ attitudes about their own declining mental health is summarised by the following lines:<\/p>\n
\u00a0<\/p>\n
PRIEST<\/strong> \u00a0<\/p>\n And that’s exactly what they do…nothing. Each insists on putting their happiness on external factors. Colm, wanting to have something worthwhile in his life, puts everything into his music, and blames all of his failings on Padraic. Padraic, meanwhile, puts everything into Colm and the few others that inhabit the island, and refuses to address his own issues.<\/p>\n This could have easily been a simple conflict with humorous encounters between the two, but the movie is so much more than that. Don’t get me wrong, I found myself laughing just as often as I cringed at the escalating senseless violence. The complexities of the characters ensures that you never really know where the story is going other it will inevitably end in a train-wreck.<\/p>\n Throughout the progression of the story, you can’t help but think that if the characters just respected each other and were honest about their struggles, things would have been a lot smoother sailing for them both.<\/p>\n For Colm, he doesn’t share his despair with anyone other than the priest. Refusing to do anything about it, he instead pushes others away and becomes insular. You get the feeling that he wants to die, and has given up. He is driven only by the desire to complete his song before he dies. He cares about Padraic, but actively pushes him away. Even then, however, he has moments where he comes back. Once he finishes his song, he dances with his dog. He even punches another man who insults Padraic showing that while he doesn’t want to be friends any more, he still cares.\u00a0<\/p>\n His downward spiral steepens when he follows up on a self-destructive promise to Padraic, throwing his fingers at Padraic’s door as if to say that he’s the cause of Colm’s lack of musical success. Unable to deal with his own self-loathing, he tries to blame Padraic for his own failures instead of taking that responsibility himself. This inevitably leads him to be unable to play music any more and has nothing to fill the increasing void of his life. He gave it all away because he was too cowardly to face his own disappointment in himself. Some part of him, in spite of everything still hangs on. Even when his house burns down, he begrudgingly leaves his chair and escapes to safety at the last minute.<\/p>\n Padraic, however, seems to be the opposite. Where Colm is self-loathing, Padraic is largely in denial. He can’t understand how his former best friend decided he no longer likes him. This quickly becomes a mission to prove him wrong. If he just gave his friend some space things would have turned out much differently. Even that, however, is not clear cut. Colm’s despair is too large for a bit of space to fix and Brendan Gleeson plays the character in such a way so that you feel that despairing weight throughout the film.<\/p>\n Colin Farrel as Padraic, however is flighty and almost floats around the island like an optimistic balloon: happily interacting with the residents, but always seems to be on the edge of popping. You get the sense that Colin is trying to fill his own void. He, however, does it by denying reality. His stories are largely meaningless, but when he is no longer able to have an audience, he is forced to face the meaningless of his own existence. This, however, is something he does everything to avoid. He despearately tries to get Colm to be friends again so he can bring back meaning into his own life. His self-worth is defined by others paying attention to him right down to his donkey, Jenny.<\/p>\n People leave Padraic one by one over time. His sister leaves for a better job and to get away from the isolation. His donkey dies from an unplanned accident. People leaving him sends him into a downward spiral as well, and he can’t help but cling to Colm like a life raft. Needless to say, this ends badly.<\/p>\n The clearest example of Padraic’s mindset comes when his sister says she’s leaving.\u00a0<\/p>\n PADRAIC<\/strong> What about me? Padraic’s isolation has made him self-absorbed. He comes across initially as a nice guy, but this isn’t exactly the case. He genuinely feels that if you’re nice, that people owe you their time and dedication exhibiting a pretty clear example of Nice Guy Syndrome<\/a> (a good video about this and its use in moveis is here<\/a>). This is clear in how he treats his sister when she says she’s leaving. It’s not about her, but about how her leaving affects him. This is, in part, why he values animals almost over people as their affection doesn’t come with demands or conditions. They won’t leave or change. Their affection is constant, reliable, and as someone who’s self-worth is defined by others paying attention to him, their absence leaves him a shell of himself. A bomb, ready to explode.<\/p>\n The whole journey of the movie is an enjoyable, if difficult ride. It’s well-deserving of its wide acclaim. The ending, however, left me wanting. It’s inconclusive. Both men are wounded mentally and physically. Things have gone too far and they both recognise this, but they are different people, and there’s no guarantee that things will get better, or that things will inevitably fall off a cliff. I wanted a cleaner resolution, but in life there are rarely clean endings. Only messy new beginnings.<\/p>\n \u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The Banshees of Inisherin is a dark comedy, detailing loneliness, depression, isolation, and broken friendships. A lot of the film is about how the two main characters, Colm and Padraic, handle their depression and isolation…badly. A lot of the characters’ attitudes about their own declining mental health is summarised by the following lines: \u00a0 PRIESTHow\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":94,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-92","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.cyram.org\/cribeerion\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/10\/banshee.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cyram.org\/cribeerion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cyram.org\/cribeerion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cyram.org\/cribeerion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyram.org\/cribeerion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyram.org\/cribeerion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=92"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyram.org\/cribeerion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":100,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyram.org\/cribeerion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92\/revisions\/100"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyram.org\/cribeerion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/94"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.cyram.org\/cribeerion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=92"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyram.org\/cribeerion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=92"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.cyram.org\/cribeerion\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=92"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
How\u2019s the despair?
COLM<\/strong>
(pause)
It\u2019s back a bit.
PRIEST<\/strong>
But you\u2019re not going to do anything
about it?
COLM<\/strong>
I\u2019m not going to do anything about it, no.<\/p>\n
I\u2019ll have no friends at all left.
SIOBHAN<\/strong>
You\u2019ll have Dominic.
PADRAIC<\/strong>
Ah here! And he\u2019s gone off me now too.
What kind of a place is it when the
village gom goes off ya? *
(pause)
And who\u2019s going to do the cooking?!
SIOBHAN<\/strong>
That\u2019s your first question, is it?
\u201cWho\u2019s going to do the cooking?\u201d
PADRAIC<\/strong>
Well it wasn\u2019t me first question, was
it? \u201cBut what about me?\u201d was me first
question.<\/p>\n