Those Overlooked Regarded

Sometimes when reading a book or watching a film, a person asks: 'When is something going to happen, when will he do anything, what's the point? Well, as in the Irish movie Garage, sometimes the waiting is the point, the actual observing is the main exercise.
Pat Shortt plays a man at the edge of his society, no social skills, inept with people, maybe even handicapped in some way. We observe his existence and it reflects back on us, on our reaction to those different in some way. He runs the local garage, a terrible, miserable run-down spot where he gets only fleeting interactions with 'real' people. We watch him and we watch that which is around him. The picture as important as the words he speaks. The stunning photography gives a uniquely Irish backdrop of beauty to his pitiful life that he seems to enjoy, seems to be happy in. He makes a friend, sees a part of life that was kept from him. But it all ends in sadness or maybe a release, depending on how you've taken to him.
It reminds me of John McGahern or William Trevor with their painfully simple and quietly dignified view of Irish life and especially McGahern's descriptions of the unrecognised beauty in the Irish landscape and Trevor's sometimes macabre and unexpected endings. Some may say its stereotyped character stuff, but stereotypes are there for a reason: because they are true. A minor masterpiece and a genuine modern Irish experience.