You’d be wise to brush up a tad on Irish history and myth before seeing The Banshees of Inisherin, the new film from writer/director Martin McDonagh (In Bruges). Or maybe do it right after. In either event, it’s not that you won’t find plenty to love in its humor or its folktale style—or even just in the re-teaming of Brendan Gleeson and Colin Farrell. But McDonagh pulls his allegory from the Irish civil war—which occurred from 1922-1923—illustrating how there’s not much sense to be found when brother turns on brother, that sometimes things just hurt. And though you’ll surely laugh and cry and learn and such, being in a better position to understand the symbology at play makes the film all the more enjoyable.

In Banshees, good-natured doofus Pádrac (Farrell) goes to round up his best pal Colm (Gleeson) for an afternoon at the pub, a previously daily outing. Colm, however, is unresponsive, claiming ultimately that he just finds Pádrac dull and they shan’t be friends moving forward. Nonplussed, Pádrac pushes the issue, claiming they were friends just a day before. Colm responds by threatening the unthinkable: Every time Pádrac dares to engage him, he’ll chop off one of his own fingers with an imposing set of shears. Meanwhile, Pádrac’s sister, Siobhan (a luminous Kerry Condon), finds herself tired of the machinations of men, and the town idiot, Dominic (Barry Keoghan, who might be the film’s secret weapon) loiters about, creating an almost childlike lens through which the viewer might consider what is fair and what is not; the elderly Mrs. McCormick (Sheila Flitton) glides through the hills and dales like the grim specter of death, a portend of eerie things to come.

Both Farrell and Gleeson are at the top of their respective games here, and when filtered through McDonagh’s crackling script, they find real magic together. There’s something to be said for chemistry, yes, but also for a pair of studied actors digging into real-world history from a more humanitarian angle. The remote island of Inisherin somehow feels both lonely and bustling. It looms like a character unto itself and brilliantly encapsulates the challenges of a community too close-knit. The film’s trudge from bright and hopeful—starting with a literal rainbow, mind you—to muted and dreary occurs so gradually and masterfully that you almost don’t notice the colors draining from its little universe until it’s too late.

In the distance, on the mainland, explosions and gunfire; on the island itself, a crossroads bisected by a statue of The Virgin. Farrell keeps it light and funny, right up until he doesn’t. Still, as he angrily announces to Colm’s dog that he “didn’t come here for licks,” or explains to the townsfolk that he “doesn’t think we’ve been rowing,” there is a barely masked hurt. Maybe some pride. In Gleeson’s gruff and borderline pretentious elder character, too, one might glimpse the bits of themselves they don’t much like. It’s a relationship like brotherhood, yes, but almost like the inevitable moment when a child understands their parent is a mortal human. God help those who discover they don’t even like their family when they stop to think of it.

And so the question becomes who we think we are, or maybe it’s more about why we do what we do. Against the abbreviated backdrop of war, it almost seems small. And then it doesn’t. Hurt is urgent and there’s no point assigning a scale to its effects. The stunningly green Irish backdrop of McDonagh’s masterpiece almost staves away the ugliness. Almost.

10

+Masterful cast, brilliantly scripted and shot

-Subtle allegory could read as boring to some, but learn a book, bro

The Banshees of Inisherin

Directed by McDonagh

With Farrell, Gleeson, Condon and Keoghan

Violet Crown, Center for Contemporary Arts, R, 114 min.