Criminal cousins try to rebuild their lives in Cathal Nally’s likably quirky, low-budget debut feature
This ultra-low-budget feature about working-class cousins on temporary release from Dublin’s Mountjoy
prison feels a bit like the sort of sketchy, acoustic-sharp
Irish black
comedy that Lenny Abrahamson (Adam & Paul, Garage) or Martin McDonagh (from the In Bruges period) made in their early years, before they went electric and found mega-fame Stateside directing the likes of Room and Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri. That’s a high compliment, and possibly a teensy bit more than Be Good or Be Gone deserves, given it’s a smidge trite and over-the-top in places – but it definitely has spark.
Its strongest suit is the chemistry between Les Martin (who also co-wrote the script with Paul Murphy) and impish master of deadpan Declan Mills, who play Ste and Weed respectively They’re ordinary types from Dublin’s rougher zones who, in the case of Ste, blew the chance of a sporting career by getting sucked into the world of drugs and crime. Ste’s mistakes ended up costing an old friend his life, and it looks likely things will never be right with his girlfriend Dee (Jenny Lee Masterson, bringing nuance to a thinly written role), the mother of his too-cute-to-be-true moppet of a daughter Ellie May (Grace Cahill, admittedly adorable).