Seeing a film through the eyes of a child is probably not a new idea in movies but The Quiet Girl (2022) does it so beautifully the audience is mesmerised for most of its playing time.
Cait (Catherine Clinch), is a 10-year-old from a dysfunctional family. Mum pops children out every year so hasn’t time to mother and Dad doesn’t work, drinks alone and gambles hopelessly. The neglected Cait is sent to spend the summer with her mother’s cousin and husband.
Here she blossoms in a house where “there are no secrets.” Turns out there is.
As Cait is driven to Eibhlin and Sean’s farm the camera pierces the side windows of the car exposing sunlight through the trees. It conjured memories of long-ago road trips with my parents: this is the view a child sees. The film is the view Cait sees.
The Quiet Girl stems from an acclaimed novel, Foster, by Claire Keegan, who deservedly earns a writing credit here alongside director Colm Bairead.
Eibhlin (Carrie Crowley) is probably very similar to her cousin Marie (Kate Nic Chonaonaigh) but there is a vital difference. She has no children and can devote her time to rearing Cait. Husband Sean (Andrew Bennett) at first shows no interest in Cait rather like her own father Ray (?) (Michael Patric) but at least Sean is a provider.
Thrust into having to parent her when Eibhlin goes to assist a friend with a dying father, Sean becomes pivotal in her happiness.
(It is a sad reflection on this reviewer’s mindset or a preponderance of the issue in television and film, that I thought in one scene where Cait lies in bed and hears the door open that it may be Sean come to take sexual advantage of the young girl. Happily, it was Eibhlin come to tuck her in).
Most of the film is spoken in the Irish dialect with subtitles to help the ignorant (Thank heavens because I understood only one utterance of Ray through his many lines, spoken in English).
Just as we see the world through child’s eyes, we also hear the same. Cait is not privy to adult conversations. She is asked some questions about home but no judgements are voiced. For example, why on her home farm the hay had yet to be brought in and Cait’s answer, “Mammy hasn’t got the money yet.”
What does Ray do? He looks fit and strong enough. You see this in Eibhlin’s mind but she doesn’t burden Cait with her opinion.
Meanwhile Sean and Cait clean the cow shed, milk the cows, collect water and she runs for him to the letter box, just as thousands of fathers have sent their children in a race against the clock to make the child feel worthy.
But there is a secret at the summer haven. When Cait attends the wake of the friend’s now-dead father she is walked home by a neighbour who offers the friendship of her children as a suitable reason for Eibhlin and Sean to stay put.
The woman is exposed as a complete busybody, peppering the child with personal questions about Eibhlin’s habits. “Does she use margarine or butter when she makes cakes?” seemed a ridiculous question. It’s grist for the mill to this frustrated and horrible gossip.
It is she who tells Cait about the son Eibhlin and Sean had lost, “drowned in the slurry after following the dog in.” There is a secret in this house.
The clothes she has been wearing for a month and the train engines on the bedroom wallpaper become more obvious to Cait. She loves the two people who are looking after her and can see they have suffered a loss far more profound than the dysfunctional absences in her own home.
The irony of the ending is that one loving couple who cannot have more children are a much-better fit than the exhausted Ma or useless Da, the biological parents who have far too many.
The audience is left with Cait chasing Eibhlin and Sean after they have dropped her back after the summer. Ray runs too to get her back, even though he doesn’t want her.
Meanwhile, Sean hugs the child in probably the first genuine paternal cuddle of her life.
It is a beautiful ending to a beautiful film.
SIDE NOTE: If Ma was so busy why weren’t the three teenage and sub-teen daughters helping? It seemed incongruous.
Score: 4.25
I WRIGHT 