ONCE

ONCE
I saw this film in NZ. I had seen the shorts here but a quick look at the paper suggests that it has yet to be shown in Melbourne. I may be wrong and it may have come and gone.

Wellington has three movie theatres under the Lighthouse banner –They are small, intimate and have couches rather than chairs. You can take in food and drink and the idea is to relax and enjoy. There is one out of Wellington at the Pauatahanui Inlet. It is hard to know how it could be a going concern in such an out of the way place and I look forward to seeing if it is still there on my next visit. It is to be hoped the locals turn out for all the showings.

It is next to Rushes Restaurant and also has a café attached. So food and a movie work well. There’s a nice atmosphere in the theatre complex.

Two old friends and I lunched at Rushes then popped in next door to see ONCE. We took the back row and sank into a comfy pink couch. This still means that we were closer to screen than I like to be - it's a very small space.

The story is simple. It opens with a busker singing his heart out on the streets of Dublin. Glen Hansard, the busker is the lead singer of an Irish group called Frames.

Glen as the busker sings other people’s songs during the day for money and his own in the evening for his pleasure. Marketa Irglova, plays a Czech immigrant who is drawn to Glen’s original material.

It is a fascinating movie of two people drawn to each other and who endeavour to make music – a demo disc.

There were some lovely parts and some quirks. It is heart warming watching them put together the beautiful song “Falling slowly”. The words for this are on the marketing flier at the cinema. There is comedy where she is following him with a vacuum cleaner flowing behind her behind as if she was taking a dog for a walk. Just a few of the moments that keep coming back.

The film is quirky. For one thing the two main characters don’t have names. It was only afterwards, when we were discussing it that I realized this. They are referred to as the guy and the girl.

You could say it was a little movie, filmed with a hand held camera and I gather on the smallest of budgets. It is even more impressive because of this. I like the way it ends. They both face the reality of their lives and move on in a very practical and probably mundane way. Then that’s what a lot of life is about.

I didn’t know of Glen Hansard before this and I wonder if the music itself would mean more if you were familiar with his style. I wasn’t drawn to it enough to get the CD.

Try to see it even if you need to wait for the DVD.