L'Irlandais

I couldn't wait to see this. It was everything I thought it would be and more. Brendan Gleeson is too funny! Don Cheadle was great as the deadpan F.B.I. agent who is thrown into an Irish town full of wacky characters – and most especially so – is Gleeson. His multi-faceted life is surprising and hysterical. Certain areas of it are sad, but there's enough humor thrown in to alleviate the risk of something being taken seriously enough to change the mood. Each character plays a significant part in the story, and the entire supporting cast did an incredible job.

What a fun, wonderful film. Great cast with Mark Strong, Don Cheadle, Liam Cunningham, and Fionnula Flanagan; but the real gem is Brendal Gleeson as the main character-an unorthodox Irish Guard (policeman) who seems put on this planet just to crack jokes at other people. Gleeson owns every scene-whether joking with his mom or ragging on the American FBI agent. All the while his character hides an intelligence and honesty that other people don't know what to make of. Do yourself a favor and watch this.

Away wit ye, ya bollix, next ye'll be asking me to explain small versus far away. The Guard is one of those low(ish) budget movies which somehow demonstrate great production values, put together by an experienced crew and edited as close to perfection as possible. It just works. The setting, Ireland's visually stunning West coast, a real land of legends and bandits, helps those production values along, providing sets and backdrops which some would say are unequalled. Don Cheadle's Wendell Everett looks like your archetypal fish out of water. A bit like John Shaft who's taken a wrong turn at the top of 110th Street and ended up 3000 miles away on the West coast of Ireland. Wendell is the perfect straight man for which to bounce the stream of laconic asides, jokes and insults of Gleeson's dead pan Sgt. Boyle. The script is tight, the humour genuine and the pathos effective. I'll bet it was a good crack working with that cast and I think that fun shows through in the acting.

This film is, at least, controversial and difficult to judge. The plot is based on a crime and the difficult collaboration between an FBI agent and a very unorthodox Irish police officer, played by Brendan Gleeson. The work of this actor is excellent and gives strength to the film. No one can doubt it. He can fit his character in that sensitive gap between the comic and the grotesque, giving him a lightness worthy of a comedy full of black humor. He is a cop who does everything a cop should not do, and yet we feel empathy for him. Don Cheadle plays the conventional American cop but has funny dialogues, such as his Irish colleague, who seems to despise his methods and way of working, as well as not being able to say a sentence without causing embarrassment to his own force. In fact, dialogues are something to emphasize here. The use of slang is plentiful, so it's best to prevent younger ones from watching, but it was also the first time I ever heard Gaelic in a movie.

The best ever film opening scene and the high standard is kept up all the way to the end. This style of comedy film could only be made in Ireland, or possibly Scotland, and it's very well cast and acted. The lack of CGI is the only reason I can think of for someone to give this superb comedy a low rating, for some the more CGI in a film the better it is. Probably not liked by the Irish Tourist Board. Do not miss it and it can be watched several times without the enjoyment reducing.

This is a very rare movie that got everything as: feel good movie, thrilling, funny and almost all you can think about, with good actors. Everything you need to enjoy a good movie