In Bruges (2008) – 4/5

Wonderful movie and extraordinary writing, they should make McDonagh an honorary citizen of Bruges

„In Bruges“ is a co-production between the United Kingdom and United States in the English language and this was released back in 2008 and it returned to the big screen a few days ago again on the occasion of a film series on Irish movies. I was lucky to enough to watch it there and I surely enjoyed the experience a lot, even if this was not a new movie to me anymore. It loses nothing on rewatch except the surprise factor of what is going to happen next. You will probably also discover something new on each viewing as this film has extraordinary attention to detail and I am happy for Martin McDonagh that he scored an Oscar nomination for his screenplay here. He really made it big in the years afterwards and his most recent films became big players at the Academy Awards. For me personally, this is probably his best film until now. He was already an Oscar winner in the short film category when he made this film and the rise came quickly as the trophy went to him for the only short film he made before moving on to full-feature films. In said short film, the central character is played by Brendan Gleeson, an actor I really like, so it was surely no coincidence that Gleeson also plays one of the two main characters from this film here. The other is played by Colin Farrell and of course this brings back memories from watching „The Banshees of Inisherin“ as those two united there again under the direction of McDonagh and both actors scored their first Oscar nominations, even if it is debatable if they were really better in this new film than they are here. I personally would not say Banshees is a weak film, but it is very tame and sadly also inferior compared to McDonagh letting it all out with this one here. What an enjoyable watch this was! I am happy for McDonagh winning a screenplay BAFTA and also for Farrell winning the Golden Globe. Seemed like a fairly unconventional choice, but definitely not undeserving.

If we look at the cast, there are other familiar names in here or at least faces, not only the two leads. There’s no way Gleeson I supporting here by the way. Zeljko Ivanek is always easy to identify, even if you maybe do not remember his name right away. Thekla Reuten is so stunning here. Renier and Poésy bring some French touch. And of course there is Ralph Fiennes, who plays the closest the film has to a real antagonist. But he is not a bad guy either totally. He is just a professional really. But look at his motives. He wants to kill a man who (accidentally) shot a young boy. He is ready to forgive Gleeson’s character or at least he won’t kill him, even if this was his original intention. He has his morals and if he wants to kill somebody else for killing a child, the same rule applies to him. And of course, he also helped Gleeson’s character in the past when the latter wanted his wife’s killers dead. Already the way Fiennes’s character is introduced was so memorable basically, how we see him on the screen the first time during this phone conversation and his anger attack. The words he used towards his wife immediately afterwards stayed in the mind for me too and I found them totally hilarious when I saw the film the first time. This time, they were still interesting because of the double meaning to what he said. You will know what I mean. But yeah, he even apologizes to his wife before he leaves then, so another moment that shows us he is not evil. Or at least not entirely evil. This film is really packed with moments in which you find references that were already used on other occasions in the movie. Sometimes they are so small, sometimes they are really big. One of the smaller ones that I really liked was the reference to the swans in Bruges. How they were mentioned during a phone conversation was quite hilarious and one of the first shots of Fiennes we see also takes place near the swan lake in Bruges.

So this film certainly also could have been part of a film retrospective on Belgian movies. It is as much as it can be a tribute to the city mentioned in the title here. You will find a great deal of mesmerizing architecture in here. I think the only brief scene that is not in Bruges is Fiennes’s character in Britain, London I think, before he travels over. His words later on when he gets his gun are also memorable. Another brief, but significant moment in terms of the kind of bullets he chooses, namely those that literally make the head explode. The consequence then is when he shoots Farrell’s character in the final scene and also hits the miniscule character in the head, the latter’s head bursts and Fiennes‘ character does not realize that it was not a child he killed there. So he does what he has to do in the face of this misperception. The words of Farrell’s character there are not heard. With him we do not know if he survives, if maybe these special bullets do not do totally serious harm to the body as they do to the head. But he is severely wounded nonetheless. It’s an open ending in terms of if he is the only one from the trio who makes it out alive. There are so many other funny moments in here, also when Farrell’s character is caught in the train before he can leave to another city and the way the officer there talks. Or take the man in charge of who goes up the tower. Money is not more important to him than principles. Not even a lot of money. He is quite the professional too. Just like the lady from „No Country for Old Men“. Sorry, that was a bit random. Anyway, there is an interesting reference too if we look at the early scene between Farrell’s character and these really big American tourists, which was funny to watch of course, but also we can probably guess that it was one of them, most likely the guy who died up there and may be the reason that the tower was closing earlier that day then.

The romance story surrounding Farrell’s character did not impress me too much here, but it was still a good inclusion, how the woman tried to trick him initially and rob him with the help of her boyfriend, but for a professional killer, even if he was only on the making, like Farrell’s character, it was not difficult to take out the bad guy there and literally take one of his eyes out. Interesting twist too that the girl stayed with the main character afterwards. Almost evolutionary, also if you look at the scene where he attacks these folks at the restaurant or I also liked the moment when he called her „nice“ and what it did with her. Her previous boyfriend was long forgotten at that point and there of course coincidence played a vital role when the latter saw Farrell’s character outside in the evening. But he got lucky that Fiennes‘ character did not kill him, just gave him a little humiliating speech about how he really needs to stop whining about all this because he did mess up so badly and the injury was just the consequence. What else? Oh yes, the music in here is also really good, no matter if we are talking about a piece in the German language, a very Irish song or the theme that Carter Burwell wrote for the movie and that was used in the opening segment and also later on again. Fully instrumental. It was so catchy that my guess was that it may be from some old legendary composer, but it was indeed all Burwell. Huge respect to him. Of course, the film is also packed with references about religion, no matter if we are looking at the killing that went wrong before the film started and we see it in a flashback sequence or if we are looking at the place in which believers come to literally get close to the blood of the Lord, even if this scene was also funny because of Gleeson’s character’s reaction to Farrell’s character’s lack of interest. He was all about the girl really. And anybody who thinks that Gleeson has not a lot of comedic talent, needs to look at the scene in which he moves onto the screen there or only his head and at that point, he just consumed some cocaine I think. Gleeson probably played the most likable character from the movie, even if he is really very tough too. Look at the mention of what he did to the guy with the bottle. And also look at how he is indeed a mentor to Farrell’s character here if we see this scene that escalates so hard at the restaurant there.

So yeah, this is a film that will have you on the edge of your seat without a doubt, but also make you smile or even laugh on quite a few occasions. But the drama is also there as good as it gets. Just look at the moment when Gleeson’s character is ready to shoot Farrell’s and he runs towards him, but is literally interrupted by Farrell’s character being about to commit suicide. This was also hilarious by the way to see Fiennes’s character’s outrage when he finds out about what happened there. But what stayed in the mind more from this scene other than Farrell’s character almost getting killed twice is the two men sitting on the bench afterwards and giving their gun(s) to one another and you could see that they have really become close friends and there was no hatred between the two or fear, even if they knew the other could always kill them right away to save his own life. Or actually the way things really were like is that they knew they would not do it. And had nothing to fear from each other despite what happened minutes earlier. I guess it was especially the way how Farrell portrayed his misery and suicidal energy in this film that got him to win the Golden Globe and also got him close to the Oscar nomination. His performance is definitely among the highlights of it all. I would have to dig really deep here to find something that felt extremely off or unrealistic with this movie and I don’t want to today, so let’s just leave it at that. Here we got an extraordinary film that you really do not want to miss out on. Of course, you should be able to stomach the great deal of violence, but this is the only dealbreaker when it comes to deciding to see this film or not. It is a big yes from my side.