Review of The Guard (2011) by Jens S — 28 Jun 2014

True story: One day while I was being driven along the coast of Galway I was struck by the thought that this part of Ireland is not unlike the old west(from the movies!). There is a strip of road somewhere between Galway city and Connemara where nothing much exists but stark countryside, dry stone walls, and vast desolate fields stretching to infinity. There are places which would be really fitting for two squinty-eyed cowboys to draw fire upon one another. There are areas where one wouldn't be surprised to find a cluster of tumbleweed drifting by.

Perhaps a similar contemplation came to John Michael McDonagh before he penned and directed his first screenplay, which transfers the tropes of the old west to the west of Ireland. The movie is lovingly shot in the style of a spaghetti western but McDonagh is not limited by any genre here. If you look at the poster art for ''the Guard'' it looks like another goofy buddy cop movie where two seemingly incompatible personalities are thrown together for comedic effect. And that's exactly what it is, but with what style and heart. The tried and true mismatching of the straight-laced good cop and the cavalierly corrupt bad cop has never seemed so fresh and funny. Brendan Gleeson puts in a brilliantly nuanced comic performance as a morally questionable policeman, and he is nicely rivalled by Don Cheadle, who embodies the scrupulous and tightly wound cop admirably. Cheadle plays FBI agent Everett, who arrives in Galway to work on a drugs bust. Of course, when these two contradictions are thrust together natural hilarity ensues. McDonagh's writing derives delicious dark humour from the incongruity between these lawmen, all the while offering a rich exploration of stereotypes, genre clichés, and culture clashes.

Gleeson stars as Sgt. Gerry Boyle(sure to become an iconic figure of cinema in the future) who is one of the funniest characters I've seen in any movie in recent years. Although essentially a comic figure, this politically incorrect cop is not without depth, and Gleeson plays the role with a mischievous ambiguity. We are never quite sure what to make of him. On the one hand he is a very bad and rather corrupt cop. He steals drugs from the jackets of dead bodies; he has a penchant for Dublin hookers. On the other hand he cares for his mother(Fionnula Flanagan) with sincere affection, and surely anyone who loves his mother can't be a bad guy? On the other hand (though I'm aware I have quite run out of hands!) he often seems very idiotic and culturally ignorant. On the other foot we are never quite sure if he is genuinely foolish or simply putting it on for kicks. Are his racial slurs the result of innocent ignorance or is he playfully trying to get a rise out of Everett? He occasionally betrays an intelligence and guile which defies his apparent cluelessness. He is often sharper on the uptake than his fellow officers and we learn that he has even read some Gogol. At once a man and a myth, Boyle must be one of the most elusive and enigmatic characters to ever grace the screen. His stoically enduring new partner sums up his contradictions quite neatly: 'I can't tell if you're really motherfucking dumb or really motherfucking smart.'.

McDonagh has just as much fun with his bad guy characters, playing around with tough-guy caricatures to great effect. When we first meet these three baddies(played with aplomb by Mark Strong, Liam Cunningham, and David Wilmot) they are not in the midst of any dubious activity but rather intelligently discussing philosophy. Behind the wisecracking absurdity and the affectionate west-of-Ireland blarney the movie has a soft heart, illustrated in Boyle's oddly sweet relationship with his ailing but spirited mother. The back-and-forths between Gleeson and Flanagan are very funny, mostly because Boyle's mother is just as un-pc and unconventional as he is. Yet there is also one unexpectedly poignant and quietly affecting moment between the two of them in a pub. A moment where we feel we may have caught a glimpse of the real Boyle. The man behind the myth.

This is the debut feature from John Michael McDonagh, whose brother Martin McDonagh wrote the excellent ''In Bruges.'' These talented siblings have similarities in style and storytelling. Both love to play around with genres and movie archetypes. Both know how to extract extraordinary performances from Brendan Gleeson. Both love a bloody good shootout. If you could accuse the two of them of any crime, it's that their work is sometimes a little too self-referential and quirky for its own good. That was certainly the main issue I had with John Michael's somewhat disappointing second feature ''Calvary,'' and Martin's slightly problematic sophomore feature ''Seven Psychpaths.'' Here, however, the first-time writer and director controlled his experiment beautifully. With rich dialogue, memorable performances, and inventive style, ''The Guard'' is a pure delight.