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Director:
John Crowley

Starring:
Cillian Murphy
David Wilmot
Michael McElhatton
Kelly Macdonald
Shirley Henderson
Colin Farrell
Colm Meaney

Release: 19 Mar. 04
IMDb

Two people talk chummy at a counter. She’s a cashier, he’s a customer, and their conversation seems destined for a romance. Why then, does he suddenly pull a gun on her and rob the store? That’s par for the course in interMission, a light but forgettable Irish charmer about wannabe thugs who really just need to be loved.

Coming light years away from the schmaltz of Richard Curtis’ Love Actually across the Irish Sea, interMission is the type of multi-character one would surely compare to Altman, but its manic mentality seems far more akin to Scotsman Danny Boyle (who has worked with three of the film’s stars). A Trainspotting with more humor, first-time filmmaker John Crowley’s film might not quite reach the same level of artistry Boyle has attained, but Crowley’s characters are more lifelike and believable than many of the malcontents and misanthropes who checker the Boyle oeuvre.

Set around a bank robbery that’s spurned by cutbacks in the mass transit industry, the woes of being in the working class, and the need take revenge on the ex, the buffoons who think a payday is nearby lack the humanity of, say, H.I. McDonnough in Raising Arizona but their ineptness has a charm all its own, even if their ringleader, the thief of the opening Lehiff (Farrell; in a performance that reminds us why he was such a find before he went into the Hollywood formula factory) is the most amusingly vicious person since Robert Mitchum in The Night of the Hunter.

Heist films, admittedly, are a dime-a-dozen, but when they click, it’s often exhilarating to see the genre reimagined. There’s little new to interMission, but its intents are enjoyable, nonetheless. The characters aren’t looking for greatness (with the exception of Colm Meaney’s brutally exploitive cop), just diversions from their everyday lives. This film is just another suitable –- if more legal –- diversion from ours.