Movie Review: ONCE

Boil It Down: Quietly brilliant and emotional with two outstanding lead performances and songs which instantly resonate with every segment of the audience.

The brilliance of Once is ingrained in its very concept.  Two people finding one another and making music together.  Yes, this is a movie "musical" but not in the traditional sense.  There are no grand musical numbers where everyone involved mysteriously knows every word to every song.  Dance sequences are similarly absent in favor of writer/director John Carney's careful probing of this new relationship.  It's not a sexual one, or even romantic.  Once cares only about the music the two create and the emotions which can be unleashed from that music.  Make no mistake: Once is filled with songs designed not to radio hits but to articulate the things the characters can't say to one another.  "Falling Slowly," the track leads Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova won an Oscar for, seems to point to a romantic relationship between the two.  That's not the point of the story; it wants to show a man and a woman being friends, being involved in each other's lives for a specific amount of time and then the inevitable

And that shouldn't be seen as a downer or a depressing finale.  Rather, the entire endeavor is positive for both Guy and Girl (Hansard, Irglova).  Nights that are spent with her mother and daughter to a whirlwind recording session in the third act, the audience is allowed to see their friendship grow over the course o f the 85-minute running time.  It starts innocently enough as she strikes up a conversation with him on the street.  Her job is to sell roses while he sings on street corners and works in his father's vacuum repair shop.  Initially, at least, he's antagonistic to her for putting a pittance into his guitar case.  And that's all it takes for her to become enamored with his music and he with her.  (No, neither of the main characters has a spoken proper name, hence the "him" and "her" references.)

Theirs is a relationship of convenience for both of them, in a sense.  Neither knows what they need even though it is essentially the same thing: Girl needs a wake up call, someone to remind her of who she is in the grand scheme of things while Guy requires a swift kick in the pants.  See, a revelation in the second half of the film will expand the Girl character, revealing a key piece of information Guy and the audience don't have access to.  In a strange land cut off from the things which have defined her, it is easy to forget who you are or where you come from.  Guy turns out to be the reminder of another life even if he doesn't know it.  Each time he tries to make that first romantic bridge to her, something goes off in her head like a mini-explosion.  The audience doesn't get it until the twist is out in the open; at least initially, any number of reasons are possible for the brush off.

As for Guy, there's isn't much in the way of ambition in his world.  Content to sing on the street and work with his father, he's the more passive of the two.  It is Girl who sets his mind onto a definite goal (recording tracks in a professional studio).  She takes control of both a bank loan meeting and the deal for the recording studio.  And she refocuses his mind on an ex, someone he's let go of in some ways.  Perhaps sensing Guy is ready to latch onto her, she constantly reinforces the idea of not letting someone go easily.  She is a proxy of sorts for the ex in the melancholy "If You Want Me;" this track also happens to play over the second most captivating musical scenes in the movie as Irglova walks down a street at night with a CD player.  The most captivating?  "Falling Slowly," filled with an overwhelming sense of magic in the air.  The director allows the two to engage in long, single takes before cutting to a new shot from various vantage points around a piano. 

Carney tells the audience early on both characters need something in their lives, though he leaves it largely for the music to convey.  With music, they are more comfortable sharing with one another, not to mention the world around them.  Take, for instance, "Broken Hearted Hoover Sucker Fixer Guy," which he sings for her on a public bus.  He simply can't work up the gumption to talk about a prior relationship, so he sings about it.  The scene remains realistic to these characters without becoming corny, cliched or laughable.  Through music, the needs and desires of both characters come out in a form which doesn't rely on exposition.  Let's face it: if Once had not been a musical, the sheer amount of exposition in the film would doom the finished product to being unwatchable.  The myriad of music exists solely to take the place of moving the plot forward in the conventional ways. 

There's is a tenderness in the lyrics I alluded to a moment ago.  They are always heart felt and true, a characteristic the movie shares in spades.  When Girl storms out of Guy's room after he asks her to stay the night, the action rings true to her character.  Here is an independent woman, an immigrant to Ireland who almost resents the insinuation she would sleep with someone she basically just met.  (A plot complication down the line also has a bearing on the decision.)  Even the finale, which is not the normal way movies like this end, is truthful to the situation.  Both Hansard and Irglova are relative newcomers to the film world, which works to the Once's advantage.  They project sincerity in each scene, without a drop of pretense or actual "acting."  They're real people, blemishes and all, interacting in their respective world's as would be expected in reality.  A scene late in the film between Guy and his father (Bill Hodnett) turns out to be humorous not because they're cracking jokes, but because of a form of miscommunication between the two.  Guy doesn't want to leave his father alone while Dad basically kicks him out of the house.  Neither of them dwelled on the situation to excess throughout the story.  It happened to be a conversation organic to their relationship.

Organic.  That may be the best word for Once.  Filmed in 17 days, the story refuses to be flashy or anything but what it wants to be.  It is a portrait of a small sliver of their lives, content to drop the audience into the situation and then take us out of it.  The actors certainly have to be conscious of the camera, though they never show they notice.  More than anything else, Once feels as though Carney followed two real people on this journey and cut the footage together afterward.  Some sequences are noticeably shot on hand-held cameras; there is a gentle swaying back and forth which would detract from other productions.  In this one, however, the effect only adds to the sentiment. 

In some films, an in-depth discussion of the plot mechanics...tearing apart the decisions and dialogue and directing and scene sequence...is warranted.  Why?  Because they offer very little which is new to the world of film.  Those films wash over us in a certain kind of way, either through their massive special effects or larger than life characters.  And, to be honest, the population needs them as an escape.  Once also washes over the audience, however in a different way.  Quietly, deliberately and honestly with grounded emotions, realistic characters and a refusal to overstay its welcome.   

Once is available on DVD.