The Quiet Man and Banshees of Inisherin: Lots in common. One big difference.
One’s a Rom Com. One’s a Black Comedy.
Near Galway where his parents were born, director John Ford will be honored this weekend with a film festival devoted to his masterpiece The Quiet Man.
Secular sainthood in the world of cinema was bestowed on Ford years ago. No one else has ever won four Best Director Oscars. Stephen Spielberg has declared him the best ever. Yes, John Ford is arguably the GOAT of movie directors.
This weekend’s celebration of his Irish films is a first-time tribute to the man born John Martin Feeney in Portland, Maine on February 1, 1894. This gathering is not to be confused with the goings on honoring Ford daily in the village of Cong, which features a museum, daily screenings of his classic, walking tours and a themed B&B.
The Quiet Man pub is still in business.
This weekend’s John Ford Fest will be held in An Spidéal(Spiddal), which is 43 miles south of Cong and 12 miles west of Galway. (Note - The Guard, directed by John McDonagh, is set partly in Spiddal.)
Twelve miles west of Spiddal you’ll come to Rossavel Harbor. A 40-minute boat ride will take you to the Aran Islands (Inishmore, the largest; Inishmaan the second largest; and Inisheer, the smallest) where MartinMcDonagh filmed his Irish masterpiece seventy years after Ford made The Quiet Man.
McDonagh’s Banshees of Inisherin isn’t likely to inspire the kind of reverence and commercialism inspired by Ford’s 1952 film starring Maureen O’Hara and John Wayne. Banshees tourism is not likely to become a thing.
Again, one is a Rom Com with great passion. The other is a Black Comedy with grim passion.
That’s what’s different about these two movies.
Here’s what they have in common
TWO STRONG WOMEN - Mary Kate Danaher (Maureen O’Hara) and Siobhán Súilleabháin (Kerry Condon). These two formidable characters manage to hold their own as they battle with not only masculine intransigence, but with a society that accepts what they won’t - second class status for women. While Danaher has to fight for her right to her dowry and family treasures, Súilleabháin has to fight for her sanity. Scene with Colm, who’s “rowing” (arguing) with her brother Pádraic. Colm: “I just don’t have a place for dullness in me life anymore. Siobhán: But you are living on an island off the coast of Ireland, Colm, what the hell are you hoping for like?” In the end, Kate stays in the village. Siobhán leaves for the mainland.
FOUR MEN FIGHTING - Sean Thornton (John Wayne) and Will Danaher (Victor McLaglen) in The Quiet Man. Colm Doherty (Brendan Gleeson) and Pádraic Súilleabháin (Colin Farrell) in Banshees. Thornton, the American expat, may come to Inisfree seeking peace but neighborhood bully Danaher won’t allow it. They literally fight each other in the cottage, on the street, through the stream, and across the fields of Connemara. In Banshees, Doherty, the nonconformist who seeks silence and can’t take it any longer when Súilleabháin won’t leave him alone, wages his own passive aggressive battle in ways beyond belief.
SIMILAR NAMES - INISFREE and INISHERIN - Inisfree is where Thornton was born. Inisherin is where Doherty and Súilleabháin were born and the banshee Mrs. McCormack lives. For the ex-fighter it’s a dream come true. For the others it’s a nightmare they can’t wake up from. Martin McDonagh has spoken about his love for The Quiet Man. He’s also spoken about his disappointment with some of the over-the-top Oirishness in Ford’s movie. Calling his movie what he did would seem to indicate that respect won out over scorn.
THE PUB - In both movies, characters keep going back to the local like players in a western drawn to the saloon. It’s called Pat Cohan’s Bar in Inisfree and J.J. Devine’s Public House in Inisherin. (I thought there would never be the kind of fol de rol for Banshees that Quiet Man inspires. I thought wrong. J.J. Devine’s public House was rebuilt elsewhere in Co. Galway inside Mee's Bar.Unfortunately, Mee's Bar has gone out of business.)
THE ERA - Definitely the 1920s for both. Banshees is set on April 1, 1923. Ireland is at war with itself; the terrible Civil War was entering its final weeks. There’s no specific date for The Quiet Man so it’s hard to say where things stood in Ireland conflict-wise. America’s chief movie censor Joe Breen sent the script to British film censors who had the final edit, it is said. So we’re left to wonder what’s REALLY going on. And when.
THE SCENERY - American movie-goers had never seen Ireland the way they saw it on the big screen in the summer of 1952. From the opening shot in Technicolor of Ashford Castle to the stunning brightness of Mary Kate’s Danaher’s wardrobe, the West of Ireland left the world of black and white behind forever (mostly). Banshees picks up where Ford left off with the sublime scenery. In Banshees however, there are no castles, though Celtic crosses figure in both films.
THE COSTUMES - John Ford had all the costumes for The Quiet Man custom made in Galway at O'Maille's - The Original House of Style. It shows. So durable were those fashions that I remember relatives dressing like that into the 1960s. Martin McDonagh hired a woman to handknit the sweaters worn in Banshees. In both movies the female leads are dressed in colors that match the landscape but outshine what everyone else is wearing.
WHY WE WATCH
In 1952, The Quiet Man offered escapism, a vision of Ireland that was soothing rather than upsetting, a wonderful line up of actors and action. Seventy years later, Banshees of Inisherin gave us realism, relationships that were ruined, abusive authority figures, intrusive villagers, an equally wonderful line up of actors and inertia. One made us laugh. One made us think. Both moved us
