OK, so I watched this partly on fast-forward to get through the tedious songs, so maybe I missed something, but how did they expect to repay the 2000 Euros laon from the bank, and how did Guy afford to buy a piano at the end AND finance a trip to London (one of the most expensive cities in the world)?
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Going to London costs about 30 euro on Ryanair......?
shareYes, then it costs another 30 to get from the airport to the city, and a minimum of another 30 per night (in a youth hostel), before you even pay for food or transport ...
shareActually, it'd close to £6 to get to downtown London using the tube. If you pay the extra bit to get an Day Ticket Zones 1 to 6, you can go *anywhere* the tube might take you, as many times as you want, for about £8. And his ex was expecting him home, so no lodging costs.
BTW, they got a £3k loan, spent £2k on the recording studio, and as someone else pointed out a ticket to London using RyanAir is about £40, even £15 if you plan ahead.
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He got money from his father, - they were meant for deposit on an apartment in London, - remember?
shareMaybe it was a used piano. Maybe he used his CREDIT CARD. Why should he be any different from everyone else in that regard? The guy is in his thirties, and was gainfully employed in his father's business. Surely he has a credit card with at least a 2000 euro limit. Maybe the father paid him a modest salary plus room and board. The guy's lifestyle isn't exactly expensive. All he does is work at the shop and play on the streets. He's certainly no clothes horse. Maybe he saved most of his salary plus what he made busking for that year. We must assume that his father wouldn't encourage him to move to London on a mere few hundred quid. The father must know that the guy also has money of his own. Surely the guy intends to look for a job in London while he's shopping his CD. Maybe he intends to move back in with his ex. If so, he wouldn't need the money for the deposit. So he could use his father's contribution as partial payment for the piano.
The point is that there are several ways it could work. We weren't given all the details of his life and finances, thankfully - that would be boring.
I'm more concerned about the fact that the girl doesn't have a telephone. So how did she call her mother on the night of that singing party? And how does she call her husband? He can't call her if she hasn't a phone. Well, assuming that she calls her husband from pay phones, and she called a neighbor on the night of the party, and asked the neighbor to convey a message to her mother, then why didn't the mother give the guy that number to call from London? Why does he have to write a letter?
Whew!
The writer/director said that the script wasn't "perfect" because it didn't have to be. "Once" was noteworthy because it wasn't your typical film--it was thrown together with non-actors and a shoestring budget.
When I watched the film for the first couple of times, it didn't even cross my mind about where the money came from. I didn't even think about the girl not having a phone and the scene where she was calling her mom to tell her she wasn't coming home for dinner.
What I felt at the end when the guy talks to the mom and she says that they don't have a phone was that he wouldn't ever talk to the girl again. When you see the guy in the airport walking out of the frame and the girl looking out of the window at the camera and then disappearing as the camera pans, well, the story ends.
It's something that happened "Once". It's a really good film. Makes you think and appreciate life and love and people.
I absolutely agree. I have the DVD, and the director does say during the commentary that the script was not perfect. He was going for a tone, a "feeling," rather than accuracy or logic - and in that he succeeded. Beautiful movie. A work of art.
As I remarked in my previous post, there are several possibilities for where the money came from. One I didn't mention is that we are never told exactly how much money he borrowed from the bank. The assumption has been that, since the studio time cost 2000 euros, he borrowed that much. It's possible, however, that he borrowed 3000, or 5000 - extra money for the trip to London. And again, as I suggested previously, some of these financial details, if they had been noted in the film, would probably have disrupted the tone and emotional impact.
After all, the film is partially about dreams vs. reality. I love that scene at the piano in which the girl asks the guy if her mother can accompany them to London - his romantic dream suddenly fractured by the reality of having to live with, and support, the mother. The week the guy and girl spend together evinces a romantic purity that is rarely found. Life is full of both pleasures and disappointments. In returning to an ex-girlfriend and husband, the two are returning to the real world, so to speak. Art vs. life. I'm reminded of John Keats' "Ode to a Nightingale." Beauty is fleeting (cf. Before Sunrise). We're lucky to experience such moments, transient though they may be.
Still, I always wonder what stops writers and directors from fixing contradictions that show up in films. Seems easy enough to do. Perhaps they fail to notice. Whatever the case, the problems with this script certainly did not disrupt the pleasure I experienced in viewing Once. As far as I'm concerned, Carney and co. gave us something brilliant.
In the DVD extras they have several sequences on the set where they are discussing the scene that they are working on. It's clear that they are figuring things out on the fly--it's obvious that the script was more of an outline.
I just watched another one of my favorite films tonight, "Before Sunset". In "Sunset" they put a great deal of effort into the script (a collaborative effort) and rehearsals. It shows in the end product since it's very "polished" compared to "Once", but they are two different kinds of films. They are both great but I still wouldn't change a thing in "Once".
The "look" and feel of "Once" is really refreshing. About the lack of a phone, I was thinking tonight that perhaps the girl had a prepaid phone (like the terrorists use) and they had run out of money so that's why the mom said that they had no phone. I don't know the phone options in Ireland--it might be that the issue never occurred to them since it was a non-issue.
The loan officer scene suggested lots of questions like what they used for collateral, but it's obvious that they were playing on everyone's fantasies in that scene (the loan officer being a wannabee singer, ect.).
The scene where they go and eat and sing at that house was odd I thought. It was as if they just dropped in the scene, but then I thought that Carney wanted to show the guy and girl doing something together, it was kind of a filler scene.
But like I said, I really don't analyze "Once" too much since it's nice having a film with such a simple message. I felt like the guy was moving on to happier and better times but the girl's situation was more unclear, just like her gaze out of the window at the camera. But that's what life is like--that last shot is what leaves me uncomfortable since you want her to be happy.
We're all romantics when it comes down to it.
In the Broadway production "guy's" father gives him a small wad, and encourages him to "go", because if he stays he'll forever regret it and probably end up living above a vacuum cleaner repair shop. It's a pretty minor point, and I know lots of musicians who have taken off for parts unknown with only a couple bucks in their wallet. There are flop houses and there are soup lines and there are places to sell blood and there are streetcorners where you can play and get donations and tips. Happens all the time.
Miffed One
Maybe her mother were told not to give the guy their phone number, it happens.
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If you fast forward through a movie, don't write down your opinions..cause they're basically invalid. That being said, I doubt very much that the two of you even are musicians. During my teens and twenties I and my mates were struggling musicians, and this movie is the absolute truth about how it is being a musician. I'm not talking about someone who studied music, I'm talking about actual struggling artists. Not studio musicians who get paid for their skills as a filler. Actual artists who write and compose and actually MAKE stuff. If you don't make music, you are not a musician, you are an instrumentalist. Much like someone who does paint by numbers is not really a painter.
Anyways.. The half completed song was 2'ish minutes. I have many unfinished songs that are upwards of 7... Not sure what you put in "unfinished"... it's not like she wrote 9 bars and then got stuck.. She probably wasn't finished refining it. Depending on how you write music, you might make a rough 5 minute sketch of a song, and then refine it as you go along. Or you might write it one note at a time, both are valid methods, I have no trouble believing she went with the former method.
Not to belittle your taste in music, but if you don't like musicians who write personal lyrics.. Then.. Bummer, I suppose.. In my opinion, songs written about personal experiences and pain are always the best.
FYI, the two main actors, Glen and Markéta are actually in a band together, a duo, called The Swell Season. That's basically what made this movie extremely believable. They know how the music biz works.
I've never seen any movie about artists that have been more believable than this movie.
Also, "We avoid singers who are too self enamored with their earnest and of course quite unique (to them) torment. "
.. Not sure why you added the "(to them)" part there, maybe to make my arguement even easier, but the fact that people for the most part work the same.. Means that to write about personal turmoil is to write about EVERYONE'S personal turmoil. That's why personal lyrics work. When someone sings from their heart, they also sing from my heart, and everyone with similar pains and longings hearts. That's how people relate to other peoples works of art.
At the end of this post, I've concluded that the both of you lack the proverbial soul.
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Everybody (including you) has to ride a bike for the first time. If no one ever let someone who hasn't driven a bike drive a bike, how would anybody learn? So get over that little scene - it was not INSANE! And what kind of soft people are you that you can't tell a person (not even a friend?), "No, we're not going to watch that film"? I didn't see this movie as trying to "capture the reality of the field or business" at all. Guy meets a girl who helps him get his life back on track and she gets a piano out of it. Yes, there was music, but I find it ridiculous that you would see this as a music industry film. Oh, and from your bragging, it sounds like you are too self enamored. Better avoid yourself!
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Guy works full time or his father and probably pays no rent for his room in his Dad's house.
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