It’s so refreshing to see unpretentious movie. No high tech camera, no exaggerated emotion, no pretence. It’s filmed documentary style, watching it feels like you’re a part of a set yourself. It’s as if you observe two people you know go through this moment in their life. Simple and yet wonderful. The film itself has quite a minimal plot. As Glen Hansard (the street musician in the film and a real musician from the Frames in real life) said- it’s a movie about two people who fall in love but do nothing about it. Its purity is infectious, and understanding of emotion is touching. John Carney took a deliberate decision not to name his characters. Thus leaving the viewer bizarrely even more involved.
There’s a very nice story behind the shoot. The film was written and directed by John Carney, with big contribution from Glen Hansard who shared a lot of personal stories with him and wrote original score for the movie. The film is a musical- whether it was planed or not, is not essential as it works incredibly well. It might not have the deepest songs but they are catchy and pleasant, and somehow even emotional. ‘Once’ won the 2007 audience award at the Sundance Film Festival. It was a surprise to the whole crew. The original actor who was supposed to play the guy in the film had pulled out in the early stages and with him went all the money for the movie. So this might be the cheapest film made this year. However Carney didn’t give up on his baby and convinced his close friend Hansard to play the lead. All they were missing was a 35-year-old Eastern European woman who had to be a musician. Not an easy person to find in Ireland. However after meeting Marketa Irglova (17 year old), he changed his mind. And she proved to be a perfect choice. But even though they all were happy with how the film turned out- it didn’t get approved by any of the film festivals. As Carey still had to pay back the Arts Council loan, he worked out a plot- he’d make a 35mm print of a film and show it in all local movie houses and get Glen and Marketa to come to showings and do a little promotion. Lucky for him, on the first showing night, a representative of Sundance happened to be in Dublin and see the film. The rest, as they say, is history.
It’s a germ of film. Highly recommend.
