Mark Reviews: Once

First and foremost let me say this. I liked Once. It had a great story that didn't beat you with a stick. There was a love story, but the focus wasn't really on the love between the two musicians. Glen Hansard plays a hoover repairman who's real passion is playing music. While not repairing vacuum cleaners he performs on the street. At night he plays the songs he is writing and working on, it's then that he meets Markéta Irglová's character; an immigrant who loves playing the piano in a music store downtown. She becomes an instant fan of Glen's music and they form a friendship and maybe a little more as they write, rehearse and record Glen's music.

One of the most intriguing things about the film for me is the lack of names. Neither of the lead characters have names (at least not that I can remember, and not according to imdb). The music in this film is outstanding. Kind of like Kyp's review of August Rush, the music helped move the story along. However, in this film it was more because neither of the leads were actors, they truly were two songwriters. That for me adds a ton to the film, because when you see them performing, it's really them performing. Kyp and I had a brief discussion as to whether or not this should be considered a musical. At first (before I had seen it) I had agreed that it wasn't a musical in the true sense of the word. No big dance numbers etc... BUT, now that I've seen it I would have to disagree. The story is moved mostly by music, and you learn most of the back story through the lyrics of the songs.

So... that being said, I had one complaint... and it's not even a REAL complaint, more of an observation. While I did enjoy the film a lot, it felt like I was watching a bunch of music video's put together; I don't know if it's because a lot of it was shot with DV or what, but the it was a lot of slow pans as the character walked through the town singing... don't get me wrong, I loved it... just kind of not positive why I loved it this much.

must be the music

mm