No explosions, gun fights, super heroes or their obligatory super powers- no CGI, period! This is about as bare bones a movie and plot line as one can possibly get- and all the above, all the more worth celebrating in any gosh darn movie these days! Presented in near square format, it is beautifully shot- like as essay of color photographs shot with a twins lens reflex.
The Quiet Girl (did I mention it's entirely in Irish) is aptly named, she's just trying to survive without friends or any close attachments in an essentially loveless family. The father is a selfish, uncaring bastard and mom is barely treading water herself with the rest of the kids (and another on the way) et al...
She is sent to a cousin's farm for the summer, a couple (who we later find out) has recently lost their own young son. The wife is a loving sort who immediately takes to the child, her husband, hardened from the pain of loss is a tougher nut to crack, but slowly succumbs.
It's hard even for the audience to warm up to the girl, she is after all, "quiet," somewhat aloof (as can be expected), and not particularly cute in a way that would make one automatically warm up to her. But one eventually does take to her- it's just a kid desperately wanting to belong and be loved, by anyone. And she finally, finally, finds just that with her new relations, only to be returned at summer's end to her loveless home environment. The sense of doom is visceral, it's the kind of existence that quashes any hope, any dream, any will to continue- the kind of gut punch that breaks child or adult alike. It ends with her running after her temporary family after they reluctantly drop her off and depart for their farm, her father running after her to forcibly reclaim that which he wants no part of...
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