Movie Review: Once

By the sounds of it, or rather the no sounds, Once really hasn't been a big hit among people. By people, I mean my friends. By my friends, I mean the people I talk to mostly every day.

It was a Sundance Film, so not many of you guys may have heard about it. Lemme tell you now.

IT'S AWESOME.

Really.

It was made on a low budget, two handheld cameras and Dublin as a setting. As you can probably tell, it's about music. I first heard about it on YouTube. Some of the people I watch frequently made the recommendation, so I watched it. Expectations were high, and I wasn't disappointed.

In a nutshell, it's about two people that meet through music. It's a love story, but not really, portraying the lives of struggling musicians.

Once is formatted as a musical, with songs that beef up the storyline. The typical reaction to 'musical' is 'Oh, they randomly burst out into song instead of talking...'. Not this movie. The songs are performed at completely appropriate times. (I do love musicals when everyone randomly bursts out into song and dance, but that's a different post altogether don't you think?)

The soundtrack is brilliant. Most of you may have heard that it has won an Oscar for it's brilliance. Falling Slowly obviously deserves a mention, but Say it to Me Now is my favourite. It's so full of passion and the delivery is completely believable.

Glen Hansard (The Frames) and Marketa Irglova both do a perfect job at portraying their characters though they aren't professional actors. The director, John Carney, made the right decision casting professional musicians that could sorta act. I don't think it would have been that effective if he casted professional actors that could sorta sing. Would take away the rawness of the film.

And the quality of the music of course.

If you love music, there's nothing about this film that you won't like. I highly recommend it. Now that you all are on holiday...mostly, you have the time to go watch it. So go watch it. It's pure gold.

What it lacks in professionalism, it makes up for in heart.

:)

P.S. For those of you who haven't noticed, this post has a load of links for you to click on. It's just basically for you to get more info on whatever it is that is linked. For example, clicking on 'soundtrack' will take you right to the MySpace page for the soundrack of the movie. Simple right? Duh. Click away!