Garage (2007) User Reviews

A man who may understand more than he wants to

[fogo-5 · 8/10 · 30 May 2008]

Josie has been assigned the roles in life of pumping petrol and being the village idiot. He qualifies for the former role by being loyal to his boss, diligent about his work tasks, and friendly to the customers. He qualifies for the latter role because of some sort of mild mental disability that makes him slow to process ideas and not too good at standing up for himself. In fact he's not that stupid - one gets the impression that he was a slow child whom people got into the habit of talking down to, but that he understands more than other people acknowledge or that he even acknowledges himself.

People like Josie are litmus tests for distinguishing bullies from people who are fundamentally decent. The bullies, both teenagers and adults, treat him as if he doesn't even understand the cruel remarks they direct towards him. The people of conscience don't mock him because they know he can't respond in kind, and they recognise that he is capable of being hurt. However their kindness can only go so far: they can't engage with Josie as equals, they can't talk to him about relationships or children or careers, and the weather and the news of the town provide only a minute or two of conversational material.

Even more uncomfortable to watch than his treatment by the bullies is the use people make of him as a confidant of last resort. They unburden their hearts to him in the assumption that he has nothing better to do than listen to them, and expecting from him the kind of unconditional sympathy one would get from a pet dog. There is no reciprocation, nobody asks him how he is getting on, so Josie's unhappiness remains unarticulated beneath the conventional cheeriness that he presents to the world and the world expects of him.

The action of this slow moving film can be said to be driven by the intrusions of the wider world into a rural community. Josie's livelihood is threatened by economic development, and his role as the village idiot is threatened, if that's an appropriate word, by the dilution of the community with "blow ins". Being a village idiot is a cruel and marginal existence for Josie, but it does mean that when he takes a wrong turn, people have a ready explanation for his actions, and can be quite tactful and kind in nudging him back in the right direction. When the village fills up with more and more people who haven't known Josie since birth, his behaviour is in danger of being interpreted in a different way.

Desolation and boredom surprisingly plays a very supporting role in this movie.

[tlooknbill · 8/10 · 9 March 2010]

Believe me this is the most slow paced, void of dialog, boring independent-ish film I've ever seen. It makes Sling Blade look like an action flick. I was watching it to fight off insomnia one late night. Unfortunately it didn't work because after sticking with it to the end I was blown away by how the depiction of desolate rural Ireland life actually drove the story and gave deep meaning to the unbelievable end.

So don't get discouraged and grab that remote because you're so bored with this movie you just can't watch another minute because the deadpan, eventless story line really does say something about our society and modern life in a way that creeps up on you and slaps you in the face and makes you think.

Brilliant but bleak.

[come2whereimfrom · 7/10 · 27 March 2008]

Garage is a strange film, good but strange, its one of those films that can hold your attention despite nothing much really happening. It focuses on Josie, played by Pat Shortt, a garage attendant who isn't the shiniest tool in the box, he's harmless enough but his naivety means he is the butt of jokes and lives a very lonely existence. The town is small and everyone knows everyone and with no real friends Josie grasps at any interaction from talking to the local horse, his fleeting chats to long distance lorry driver Dan and to the blokes in the pub despite the fact they are obviously horrible to him. But it's when he gets David as his new young assistant at the garage that things start to change. Saddled with his own problems, adolescence, alienation, isolation and growing pains, David and Josie strike up a friendship, David thinks Josie is brilliant as he supplies him with beers after work and for Josie it's just someone to talk with but the seemingly harmless relationship starts to take a darker turn. With a script that is at times equal in its ability to make you laugh and feel uncomfortable the film is one which will not sit easy with some audiences, ultimately its bleakness may be a little too much for some. That said all the performances are great and while showing how the simple life can be complicated it also shows how beautiful the country Ireland is, but it's really all about the crippling loneliness that can affect us as humans and Shortt's mannerisms and portrayal are startling and in this respect it really is his film. Add to this the subtlety and calmingly paced direction and you have a gem of a movie that leaves a bitter but brilliant taste.

A Quiet character study

[tim-764-291856 · 6/10 · 26 November 2010]

Anybody who's travelled through the southern west of Ireland may already feel acquainted with such a quiet, semi-rural service station, how someone would fill up your tank for you - and that person might be someone a little like Josie.

Josie, naturally but superbly played by Pat Shortt is a slow and steady sort of bloke, who, one summer gets some help and company at work from a 15 year old work experience youth. Natural conversations develop and flow and soon, the normally insular Josie is, unknowingly bitten by this and is soon drinking cans with him and other local lads.

However, it is an object that is given to Josie by a travelling lorry driver that awakens senses in him. Its mechanical portrayal of an normally extreme emotional and intimate nature subjects Josie to an skewed stance of women. The only known cast member (to me, at least) Anne Marie-Duff is the subject of his very moderate but maligned attention. She is friendly but firm on the matter.

A further instance of poor judgement - one Josie didn't even think about - turns, quietly, his world upside down.

Other reviewers have said how bleak the film is. I disagree. The ending, yes but generally, it has the feeling of a laid-back character-led indie film. Modest in aspiration, budget and final outcome. That same outcome is one the most oft used, from Greek literature, Shakespeare and so on.

To my mind, it says a lot more about how outside influences can affect, dramatically, an area and a way of life not used to such. And maybe Ireland itself feeling the pressures of such, with traditional moral values being risked, though the film is certainly not preachy.

Take 'Garage' as a quiet character piece that gently makes its point.

poignant and touching snapshot of Irish life.....

[garvneil · 9/10 · 12 October 2007]

Garage arrives at a great time for Irish cinema. The output and standard of Irish film is at an all time low with an exception like Adam and Paul, a film from the same people that made Garage. Writer Mark O Halloran is a sure hand at capturing the subtle nuances of everyday Irish life. In his previous outing Adam and Paul he delved in to the world of two strung out Dublin heroin addicts. In Garage we join Josie in his hum drum existence as a petrol station attendant in a nameless provincial Irish village. Josie is not the sharpest tool in the box but his cheery demeanor aids the viewer in being won over by him.

Pat Short in his first dramatic role subverts his usual comic representation of the country redneck by infusing his portrayal of Josie with great pathos and genuine humor. Short has altered his stride in more ways than one here, totally changing his gait and physicality to become the character of Josie. It is an excellent performance from Short and as an Irish man who has been exposed to his previous life as simply a comic performer, a revelation.

Leonard Abrahamson who also directed Adam and Paul has made a film that is visually beautiful. The local shop, the quiet village street and the starkly beautiful Irish countryside punctuate the film creating a strong sense of place for the audience. These also serve to bring us in to the numbing routine of Josie's daily existence. He lives in terrible conditions but he blames no one and trudges on until closing time each day. Abrahamson revels in the everyday and the ordinary in Garage. Two men smoking outside a pub, a shop worker chatting to Josie outside her shop; these everyday scenes are woven in to the tapestry of Garage and in turn made in to something extraordinary.

Garage is a wonderful movie. Abrahamson as director and O Halloran as writer have made the best two Irish films of the last ten years in 'Adam and Paul' and 'Garage'. Finally I would just like to mention the great Tom Murphy who co starred in Adam and Paul as he just recently passed away. He will be sorely missed.

Good Irish Movie!

[chelletrudeau · 17 February 2008]

This is a good small-ish budget movie from Ireland that I saw screened at a film festival, okay really it was a little screening of a few movies from Europe at a small pub at university. There is some good dark comedy here as well as some very interesting and well done cinematography.

The story focuses on a guy who works at a gas station who ends up falling into a dire situation and needs to get out. He is a very lonely man with seemingly no friends and no real family.

The only other people around him don't seem to like or respect him and are even just mean to him.

I would recommend Garage even though at times it seems to drag and the plot is a little bit thin. Very interesting with some good shots and a decent performance by the lead, Shortt.

A wonderful little movie

[seawalker · 7/10 · 31 March 2008]

Josie (Pat Shortt) is an amiable, inoffensive, none-too-bright man who works in a garage. He has been at the garage for such a long time that the job is his whole life. Outside of visits to the pub and the shops, Josie lives, eats and sleeps in the garage. Josie is gentle and harmless and a figure of (mostly) good natured fun for the people in the community.

One summer, the owner of the garage hires a teenager called David (Conor Ryan) to work at the garage alongside Josie. After a slow start, Josie builds a tentative relationship with David, and David's friends, but trouble lies ahead...

For a while "Garage" appears to be going nowhere and is in no particular hurry to get there. It comes across as nothing less than a kind of adult, big screen version of Channel 4's "Father Ted". Eccentric Irishmen sporting funny accents going about their idiosyncratic business . (Don't get me wrong. This is not a criticism. I loved "Father Ted". Still do, actually). Then, with a third of the running time still to go, "Garage" takes a turn towards the dark when the innocent Josie fails to realise the limitations of a friendship between a middle aged man and a teenager. "Garage" becomes much more than just a comedy. It becomes a tragicomedy.

I think that "Garage" is a wonderful little movie. It starts slow and gets better. If you have the patience to stick with it, "Garage" will stay in your head long after you have finished watching it. That is the mark of a great movie.

This movie was amazing!

[RLuciano-OneClickFilms · 10/10 · 21 March 2008]

This movie is visually stunning in design, almost like a moving painting. Pat Shortt who plays Josie, is just absolutely brilliant! His sense of purity and sincerity is consistently communicated. I have not been able to stop talking about the film since I watched it, and NEED to watch it again.

A quick comment on it's pacing. For me, a movie doesn't have to continually stimulate me to keep my attention. If the characters are riveting and the story movies at it's OWN pace, and not with my expectations, that's the whole goal. We are so commercialized with our expectations when it comes to movies, we've forgotten to just go along with it. Garage is a movie you just go along with. The Josie character is so sweet and pure, it's difficult not to have him affect you.

There are several topics I could bring up with regards to this movie, but one that stands out. How difficult it really must be for someone challenged. This movie is a microscopic look into this world. We talk about how alone we are in the world. But imagine having a disability in the process. This movie paints one perspective of what I would imagine it's like.

The overwhelming thing I noticed, was no one was helpful to Josie. As a human being, this disturbed me greatly! This movie shows perfectly, how amazing the world would be, if we just made a little effort, to help one another. Such little effort, to make such a big impact.

For someone to not understand and feel what Josie is going through, only supports the apathy that has seeded itself in our current lifestyles, and society as a whole to date.

RL

There was upon a time a village in Ireland

[Imdbidia · 6/10 · 7 February 2011]

An Irish film about the life of gas-station caretaker, Josie, a simple-minded good-hearted man, craving for social and love interaction, but somewhat autistic or slightly mentally challenged, and of his life in an isolated town in rural Ireland.

The story has many good points and thought-provoking elements of exploration: The nature of friendship -and its limits-, the contradictions of modern Law and old ways of socializing, pace and change in rural areas, the thin limits existing between success and fracas in such an environment, and the depiction of rural life.

I think that the movie success at doing well the latter, and the viewer witnesses the lives of the town's apparently happy but deeply dissatisfied dwellers, their miseries and broken dreams, their monotonous social interaction, their role and social hierarchy, and their latent immobility and frustration. In fact, this is a movie about sad frustrated people unwilling to change living in an isolate place that feeds those frustrations.

The premise is interesting, no matter how boring life can be in any town, not even in one like this. The problem is the overall dullness of the movie, which is too slow in pace but too schematic in the depiction of the actions and character of the main characters. In fact, if the characters had been drawn with a little bit more of psychological depth and in a less descriptive way, the movie would have had benefited enormously from it. Pat Shortt, the leading actor, is inexpressive in his performance, and I don't think it is his fault, but the director and the script's.

The conversations of Josie with the horse, his interaction with some of the teens in town, his sexual frustration and the depiction of his poor personal house and life are the things I liked the most, and also how some fellow-town man and woman change their attitude to Josie when he tries to change. I also liked the end, which is both factual and metaphorical, and very moving, as it shows the repercussions that a little drama can have in the life of a dweller of a narrow-minded town.

To me, the dull performances by most actors, the tempo of the movie, and, above all, the poor direction killed a story that had many possibilities.

beautiful exceptional but sparse filming

[teresa_ewart · 10/10 · 22 March 2008]

I'm English but I lived in Ireland for 6 years until recently. Do not be fooled, Ireland today is not the vibrancy of Dublin or the bite of the Celtic tiger - like any country it is a mixture that has it's fair share of sad, empty and lonely places. This film attempts to portray this - and succeeds quite beautifully. The filmmakers are also "responsible" for the brilliant Adam and Paul -a snapshot of the struggle to live in modern day Dublin with a shocking drug habit... and Garage is no different - a few days in a life that tell us so much but share so little. The dialogue is sparse at best, just a nod and a smile to indicate friendship. The tiny visual clues show us one man's life in pictures - his lonely dinner (he bought one pork chop from the butcher) his wash in a sink. This film is one of those that is nothing and everything. I can't recommend it highly enough. Watch it and feel grateful that your life is full and vibrant. That it doesn't end with your putting your socks in your shoes...

Social Solitude

[mikelez82 · 7/10 · 24 April 2009]

Garage is a 2007 realist (even hyper-realist) film by Irish director Lenny Abramson. The film centers on the daily life of Josie (a petrol station worker who lives in a small Irish village) and the social relations he holds with his neighbor villagers.

One of the most interesting aspects of the film is the interpretation of Pat Shortt embodying the naïve Josie. The protagonist of the film is an adorable simpleton who enjoys his banal life and his boring employment at the petrol station. Despite of his utter solitude, everything seems to be alright for Josie, even when he is deliberately mocked he seems to be absolutely happy. He enjoys the pleasures of this routine but it will change when a teenager is designed to help him at the petrol station.

The portrayal of Josie is carried out by means of using the camera as a mere spectator in the story, as an objective eye that witnesses the events. It shows us Josie as he really is, without taking into account the subjective point of view of the rest of characters, giving the film an intimate and melancholic mood.

Another remarkable issue is that, with a low budget and an ordinary plot, Abramson achieves to tell a warm story, full of humanity, halfway between comedy and tragedy, in which a little piece of reality can be seen.

Abramson takes great delight in using long sequences full of long shots, so the movie depicts the Irish countryside with a lot of outdoors sequences.

Perhaps, the only negative thing about this film is its slow speed (regarding that it is only an hour and twenty minutes long). At some points this paused rhythm makes the movie tedious and difficult to bear, but it also seems that it is what the director intended: to make the audience stop and enjoy watching the details of each shot.

Great small film

[cleandump · 10/10 · 20 March 2008]

I really liked this film from Ireland for it's simplicity and detail. A guy named Josey lives and works in a Garage situated on the outskirts of a small Irish town. He has no wife, girlfriend, family, or any real friends to speak of, his hum-drum existence centers around the Garage, the occasional walk alone in the Irish countryside, and his nightly sojourn to the pub where he seems to be the butt of local humor. The thing about Josey is that he's a very likable guy, I almost thought that he was a simpleton, he never resents his situation in life, he is affable to everyone, and never complains about his lot. Josey's suffering is punctuated in small moments throughout the film, but they go almost unnoticed by the viewer. The girl he fancies tells him it's never gonna happen, the locals in the pub tell him his Garage job (which he loves) is only temporary because the owner is looking to sell the Garage and land to property developers, a horse that was previously free to roam in his field, and that Josey visited on a regular basis to feed apples, is now tethered and cannot approach the gate when Josey calls, and a moment where Josey meets a man on a bridge, the man carries a sack containing new born puppies which he is about to dump into the river, Josey and the man converse for awhile before the guy throws the sack into the river, Josey's last words to the man being "maybe it's for the best" were significant. I became totally involved watching this movie, the photography of the Irish countryside is short but wonderful to look at, the Irish lilt of the actors with every other sentence ending in the word "so" makes you feel your in Ireland, the depiction of Josey's lonely life is totally believable. A great small film.

wild horse

[piedrasygasolina · 7/10 · 6 April 2009]

WILD HORSE

Garage tells us the story about Josie, an odd employee in a gas station. The plot of the film takes place in a small village from Ireland where the life goes by calm. Leonard Abrahamson shows us the stereotypes that we can find in any rural village in the middle of nowhere. Everybody knows everybody. A pub, grocery store, gas station and railways tracks will be the places where the characters will play their role. Loneliness, boredom and rudeness go with the character's feelings who yearn running away. They seem to be trapped and with few possibilities to start again in another land. Desperation will be a fact to take into account. In this context, Josie works without anxiety and lives his own world apparently happy. A horse will be almost his closest friend. Nobody understands him or even better nobody wants to understand him. An apparently insignificant event with a truck driver will change the course of the film and lead Josie to take an unexpected decision. Garage points out loneliness and the lack of understanding as the main features of the film in which the silent makes you feel that life pass slowly. The green settings and the cloudy weather surround the film increasing that feeling of loneliness and changing the characters's behavior. The film is a tragedy with comical elements which help the audience to consider Josie as pleasant character.

RAÚL PÉREZ GARCÍA CINE ANGLOAMERICANO 2009

Melancholy, by Leonard Abrahamson

[malleus_88 · 5/10 · 1 April 2009]

Melancholy.

In the film Garage, directed by Leonard Abrahamson, we see a good example of the melancholy of a man who is alone, appreciated by many people, but this people do not go a step further in their relationship with him.

We can see in Josie's life (Pat Shortt) the happiness of the person that is not literate and does not know anything about real life, and thinks that everything is OK and that everybody takes care of him, as a childish thought about the society, but some events are going to change his mind.

This sense of melancholy is given also, apart from the performance of Shortt, by the type of shots appearing in the film, mainly by extremely long shots, covering as much images as possible, even if there are people inside the frame. This type of shots give us the feeling of loneliness that Josie feels, although he does not realize of it, and transfer us the loneliness of the Irish countryside, sad, rainy and plain.

We can see that the camera is just a witness of what is happening, it is not a watcher of the action, as an example there are not counter shots or over-the-shoulder shots, everything is just like a photography, where the director wants to have as much visual information as possible. The lack of conversation is solved by this use of the camera, and the absence of a real action is not the important characteristic of this film, but something that aims us to think about the film, not just to see it.

Darío Metola Rodríguez.

More about the peculiarities of rural Irish life

[robinakaaly · 30 December 2010]

In a remote village in western Ireland, the village simpleton runs the local garage. People are generally kindly disposed to him, though he can be the butt of their humour or a shoulder to cry on, but nobody really cares about him. The garage owner takes on a young lad to help out at weekends, and the two get on well. However, things go wrong when he innocently provides the lad and his mates with alcohol, and shows the lad a blue movie he'd been given. Following complaints, his world starts to crumble as the Garda tell him to keep out of the town, a girl he was attracted to says she is not interested, and the garage owner lets him go on account of scandal avoidance. In the end he drowns himself, as an acquaintance has drowned some puppies. Before doing so though, he releases a penned in horse: he and the horse find freedom in different ways. Very slow and elegiac, and not a good advert for the warm and friendly people of Tipperary, but still very well observed story-telling.

Finally Ireland has a cinematic voice

[Irishfilmfanatic · 7/10 · 19 July 2009]

From the team that brought us the wonderful "Adam and Paul" comes the slower and less comedic story of Josey, (Pat Shortt) a simple minded Garage worker in a changing rural town. The plot is not a 'high concept' one, and unfolds slowly with lot's of attention to character. However, it is never boring and has such a spellbinding atmosphere that one feels in the hand's of artists. The script is a sparse and economic masterclass in storytelling and the direction is of unforced confidence. The acting is flawless and the visuals again unfussy but beautiful. This all ties up to a very interesting end which will have you thinking for a long time to come.

Nothing short of a masterpiece

[michael-heathcote3 · 10/10 · 19 April 2010]

Garage is a simple slice of realism that is filmed to perfection. It looks so small, so parochial, so realistic that some may think in the first few minutes that it's pointless making into a film. It won't be everyone's cup of tea, that's for certain. But if you are a cinema lover and love depth and meaning as much as action, then this Irish masterpiece is a must! It is the study of the central character that gives the film its real point, its purpose. It reveals this very slowly, but surely, typically Irish, and the whole thing, the story, the atmosphere, the pace, the acting, the whole lot looks authentic. The central performance by Shortt is Oscar worthy. At times the film is painful to watch because it is so brutally honest in its depiction of Josie and his difficult, empty life.

The film on the surface looks very simple, very small, but you can bet there is a lot of cinematic knowledge that's helped achieve this. The writer and director have undoubtedly watched a lot of world cinema, Mainly French, maybe a bit of German - another reviewer mentioned the similarity of Bresson, I don't know his work well enough, but I thought of Fassbinder when I saw it, that microscopically intense portrait style of a struggler in life. The photography outside is very European in flavour too, with long lingering shots of the location, and using the beauty of the landscape as a piece of art - I suppose this is classically French in technique.

As with all masterpieces, the film's real power only really hits you after it has ended. The humanity of it just tears away at you, and that gives this film its noted pathos. And it is so beautifully done, every scene is perfect, the end of scene shots of Josie looking on when his friend has left, and the minute details like him counting out the biscuits is just cinematic perfection. Yes, if you know your cinema you could say that the film makers have taken a lot of inspiration from elsewhere and constructed the most affecting tragic human portrait, but that they did it so well, chose their subject so well, and got such a great performance from the lead actor, deserves a massive heap of praise. I'm not surprised that the French loved it, I'm just a little bit surprised it didn't win more awards than it did!

Masterpiece

[conormlennon · 7/10 · 14 January 2022]

No words can effect the dialogue, just all pure brilliance, You wanna make a movie, watch this, From the first scene to the tragic end, Pat Shortt has his time but he always has his time, he's just that man, a pure actor But how Lennie has run this through is so beautiful and ugly it's a work of art, Would watch this story till the end if.....

Sometimes people just fail to see the good in people

[LazySod · 9/10 · 6 May 2009]

Josie works in a garage in a small town. He mans the gas pumps, sells the oils and the magazines to the travelers. Only, the town is so small and the road is so little traveled that he hardly has anything to do. Josie has also lived in this town all his life and has worked in this same garage for almost just as long. When his boss asks him to take on the weekends as well he is up for the task - and when his boss offers to send a kid as a helping hand he accepts that kid too. All in all, Josie is a very easy guy that takes the world for what it is. Too bad the world does not fully understand that.

Although somewhat predictable this film is a rather interesting one. The way the actors play out their roles make up for a glimpse of the grim reality people like Josie live in. All he wants is do good, all he gets is evil. The message is clear from the very start of the film but never starts to bore too much. This is purely due to the way the different characters get together and depict the pretty little village the film plays in - the message fits the persons and the town perfectly. When the ending comes it is dark and dreary, but fitting and only logical.

9 out of 10 good people making bad choices

My impressions of Garage

[clint-thrust · 9/10 · 5 May 2008]

Garage is Lenny Abrahamson's 2007, award winning, (Prix Art et Essai) Irish drama, starring Pat Shortt. Shortt plays Josie, a simple, tragic character, that lives in and runs the garage in a Tipperary backwater, owned by his former schoolmate, Mr. Gallagher. His life changes over the course of one Summer, when Gallagher introduces him to a boy named David, his new workmate, and a flawed relationship begins to develop. The acting is the most realistic I've ever seen. Every character in this film is taken straight from real life. They might be fictional characters, but each and every one of them exist in villages and towns throughout Ireland. Josie might seem precious and quaint, but there are thousands out there exactly like him. Each role is played to almost frightening accuracy. The Garda, played by Denis Conway, was so real in his attitude and all his dialogue, that it sent chills up my spine. It was acted in an unnaturally close manner to that of a real Garda. The plot doesn't really go very far. It starts in much the same place as it finishes. Although, perhaps it finishes more poignantly than it starts, the poignancy lies in the character of Josie himself and is present throughout the film. Peter Robertson, the Director of Photography, did a superb job. The cinematography is excellent. It's all perfectly framed and captures a certain beauty of location, without losing any realism. Living in a similar location to where this was filmed, I can personally vouch for the accuracy of every aspect of this film. It's amazing. That, funnily enough, was my main reason for disliking this film. I watch films to escape from that sad reality, and it really isn't all that pleasant to have such a close to the bone film in front of your eyes. That was also why I hated Pat Shortt's comedy series, Killinascully. Indeed there are quite a few actors from Killinascully in Garage. People from my area (mainly tractor driving hicks) see things like Killinascully and take them as an instruction manual for life, rather than a comedy series mocking them. So, the main strength of this film, it's realism, is also, for me, it's greatest weakness. I really must congratulate the director on his accuracy, which was outstanding but not appealing to me. I'd say, if you want to know what rural Ireland is really like, watch this. If you live there, just go outside. Or preferably don't. I would recommend seeing this if just for seeing Pat Shortt in a non comedic role. It's a hugely interesting film that deserves to be taken very seriously. I just didn't find it a pleasure to watch. I'm giving it a 6 out of 10, but I'm certain it deserves more.

Astonishingly Bressonian Irish film

[Balthazar-5 · 9/10 · 19 March 2008]

Here we have a real rarity. An Irish film that really evidences an understanding of the place of film grammar in the art of the cinema. This rural tragi-comedy looks at a very uncomfortable sliver of the human condition.

It is, largely, about the way that the complexities of modern life can render the simple-minded tragically vulnerable. Under normal circumstances I hate - indeed loathe - films that 'overtly' mimic the works of dwarfingly great film makers. I am not sure that Abrahamson (the director) actually sought to mimic the wonderful, indeed sublime cinema of Robert Bresson, but I am sure that that is exactly what comes to mind when the film is watched. Thematically, it has much in common with 'Mouchette' (not best Bresson, but very good Bresson!). Stylistically, it resembles parts of 'L'Argent'! That the above is the case and it still grips and appeals is a great credit to the film makers. But it is not completely 'echt' of course. There are parts of Bresson's magisterial style (his use of close ups, and his total command of sound for example) that are largely missing, but, make no mistake, this is a wonderful piece of cinema.

At the centre of it is the character of Josie, a harmless simpleton, whose guileless sincerity leads him to be the butt of the cruel humour of the would-be sophisticates with whom he shares parts of his rural existence. But fate has an even crueller plan for Josie.

Effortlessly characterised by comedian Pat Shortt, the director's unflinching gaze shows Josie's blameless naiveté in heart-rending detail - his loneliness, his pain at the cruel jibes and his unreasoned optimism.

I really hate the style of cinema that seeks to drag its audience into a slough of despond, but though tragic, 'Garage' doesn't do that, because it retains its clear belief in cinema and its potential to lift the human spirit to undreamed of heights.

Very good script but filmed awkwardly.

[danny-castel · 3/10 · 27 October 2008]

The movie has a lot of potential with good acting but it did not connect to me although having sympathy for the story and the script certain scenes where too much for my eyes the film lacked a certain aesthetic touch. The pace of the movie is pretty slow and varies little in rhythm. The scene on the lake, and the horse greeting - feeding were one of the best scenes but that's about it. The actors did not have the change to show off their talents as the dialogs are filmed as if it was a sort of documentary. The quality of the image disturbed me a lot especially the light effects (or lack of it). I missed a certain flair and swing that exploits more the soul of the main character.

(There where many that left the cinema during the film)

Sinister humanity

[Dr_Coulardeau · 9/10 · 17 February 2008]

An extremely sad film showing how in any community in our world, in this case a small town in the Irish back country, there are a few people who are both daily punching balls and born victims. Here it is a slightly mentally retarded man who is doing a small but useful job in the community, taking care of the local gas station. At the pub he is the constant target of jokes and other remarks that treat him as if he were totally unable to understand what is being said. At times he is the object of some violence to take a cigarette from him. And no one protests. He is also used by some older people as the local listening and silent confessor. The grocery-store lady invites him to dance one night and becomes all personal and soft, and yet as soon as one of his finger touches anything else than her dress, a little patch of her own skin, she over-reacts and rejects him in public as if he had tried to rape her. His boss puts a young teenager of 15 in his hands to extend the opening hours of the gas station. A certain amount of trust and friendship develops but he offers a beer to the kid after work and even once he offers to show him the sex tape a truck driver has offered him. Then he becomes the target of a complaint at the police, of a police procedure, of a slandering campaign in the city. He cannot accept it and he goes to the horse in a field that he has often visited and offered some goodie to in order to say good bye we guess, or maybe only hello. But the horse has been tied up and cannot come to the gate. So Josie gets over the gate and says good bye to the horse. Then he goes to the river and walks forever into the water. Don't believe that can only happen in a small town in the Catholic back country of Ireland. Far from it. It could happen anywhere particularly in good old atheistic suburban neighborhoods of our cities with those people who have abandoned God to replace him with some strict and even selfish set of rules that they declare ethical or moral. But what can we make of the final scene of the horse carrying his rope around his neck and walking along the railway tracks? What a sad ending implying some, if not most, among us are nothing but domesticated animals that are sacrificed or tied up, why not hanged, as soon as they step out of the tracks that have been set for them.

Dr Jacques COULARDEAU, University Paris Dauphine, University Paris 1 Pantheon Sorbonne & University Versailles Saint Quentin en Yvelines

Fantastic study of human nature

[ronnay_barkay · 10/10 · 30 July 2008]

One of those movies you have to watch a few times to appreciate. The first time I watched it (in the cinema), I laughed along at the funny bits and It was only now (having watched it again), that I realized he was actually going to kill himself at the end of it. I realize that the director intentionally makes us feel like we are one of the characters in the movie.. Towards the end we really don't care about Josie, we have bigger problems in our lives.

This tragic scenario of the truly gentle, harmless soul being de-humanized and constantly kept at arms-length, never being shown love by the manipulative, cruel and selfish individuals who surround him is so realistic. It's one of those things that's hard to put into words, but we see it every day and we know we see it.

If you listen to the dialog you see that the central character, Josie, isn't quite as dim as he's supposed to be, standing up to the pub bully, and knowing that one of the girls in the village is of mongrel parentage (in other words one of her parents was from a different village), yet he still can't properly relate to any of his fellow humans and the fact that they don't want to relate to him just feeds the vicious cycle.

The ultimate tragedy is that we eventually get the impression that Josie never got the chance to have a relationship, being bullied and manipulated probably since he was a kid. If he had been an aggressive or even just a cocky individual the audience wouldn't feel any pity for him, but then it wouldn't be realistic.

Beautiful and devastatingly sad

[Robert_Woodward · 8/10 · 22 April 2008]

In Garage, Irish comedian Pat Shortt plays Josie, a lonely, naïve garage attendant living and working on the fringe of a small community in rural Ireland. Probably due to Shortt's usual occupation, the UK press has misleadingly described this film as part comedy and part tragedy; Garage is actually short on laughs but emerges as a quietly powerful drama.

The portrayal of rural Ireland through Josie's experiences is decidedly unflattering. Fellow patrons at the pub mock him for his simplicity and bully him physically. One of the patrons is later seen drowning a litter of puppies in the river. Josie's acquaintance with the Carmel, the young supermarket attendant, is stifled by her wariness of him. The general tone of the community is dark and unwelcoming.

The setting, though often grim and foreboding, is shot through with moments of happiness for Josie, most strikingly at the times when he feeds the horse in the field near his home. Josie's friendship with David, a teenager who joins the garage part-time as an assistant, is a fragile source of happiness, bringing him into contact with a wider circle of young people. The closeness that begins to develop between the two is complicated by some naïve decisions on Josie's part – decisions that return to haunt him.

Garage unfolds slowly and Josie's embarrassments and hurts linger uncomfortably on screen. Yet there is beauty amidst the gloom. The use of music is spare and timed to haunting effect. The camera-work is also superb, conjuring many arresting images from the confines of the garage forecourt and, at the end, juxtaposing some of the most beautiful and devastatingly sad moments imaginable.