The Quiet Girl Review | Into the Good, not Great, Beyond

For a film that has been making history as of late, the Irish Gaelic language film The Quiet Girl is remarkably standard and simple; not that there’s anything necessarily wrong with that. Adapted from a story by Claire Keegan by writer-director Colm Bairéad, The Quiet Girl is a stripped down, firmly grounded, and visually poetic story about growing up and learning about loss. It’s wholly predictable and rarely deviates from expectation, but it thankfully isn’t as manipulative as many similar English language counterparts.

It’s 1981 in rural Ireland (Waterford, to be exact) and young, demure girl Cáit (Catherine Clinch) is being sent to live with distant relatives by her pregnant mother (Kate Nic Chonaonaigh) and hard drinking father (Michael Patric). Their family is already big enough, resources are spread too thin, and Mam and Da can’t keep up with Cáit, who’s prone to running away. The Kinsellas, Eibhlín (Carrie Crowley) and Seán (Andrew Bennett), take little Cáit in to their humble home. Eibhlín takes the youngster under her wing, helping her thrive by teaching Cáit all the practical things her own parents never would. Seán, on the other hand, keeps a healthy distance. Eibhlín encourages Cáit to be open and honest, but there’s a secret at the heart of this family that neither husband or wife wishes to acknowledge.

The reveal of said secret at the end of the second act can be spotted almost the second Cáit is dropped off at her new home. The big reveal The Quiet Girl builds towards isn’t much of a twist, but at least the relative austerity of Bairéad’s writing and direction offers such predictable material a welcome change of pace. The Quiet Girl isn’t a lengthy film, so dancing around the obvious here is never grating, and the decision to frame this intrigue through the eyes of a child still learning about the world around them is a wise one. The youthful, inexperienced perspective helps to paper over the fact that The Quiet Girl is tackling a subject that has been done far better many times before and in many different languages around the world.

While there’s nothing wrong with The Quiet Girl by any stretch, the fact that it’s a familiar story told through the perspective of someone who wears an almost blank expression most of the time means there’s not much to talk about beyond a surface level. The topic at hand is one that many people struggle with, but The Quiet Girl never brings anything new to the discussion. Even the attempt to blend its message of undying familial love with the story of a girl who’s finally thriving after being given the attention she deserves falls relatively flat. The Quiet Girl goes from point A to point B well enough, but only to eventually lead to a lightly tearjerking moment.

The cinematography from Kate McCullough finds great beauty in light and darkness alike, visually honing in on the heart of a given scene with laser precision. The performances from Bennett, Crowley, and newcomer Clinch are low key and thoroughly lived in, giving the material the warmth and compassion necessary to set the scene. The string and key heavy musical score from Stephen Rennicks is positively enchanting. Across the board, The Quiet Girl deserves acclaim for doing what it does really well at every step of the journey.

And yet, I was left wanting throughout The Quiet Girl. I was moved because I’m not made of stone, but only so slightly, and the fact that it made me recall other films that told similar narratives in better fashion probably wasn’t a good sign. I expect many are drawn into The Quiet Girl by its easygoing nature and its ability to examine themes of loss, grief, and abandonment without resorting to hysterics or theatricality. It allows the viewer to feel what they want without being force fed sentimentality. It’s a film that’s rather effortless in a good way. That’s probably how this became the highest grossing Irish language film of all time, and the first movie from that country to net a Best International Feature Oscar nomination. When one considers how many better, more deserving, and more pleasingly complex films were shut out of that category, the inclusion of The Quiet Girl is downright perplexing. It’s certainly a deserving film, but maybe not one that should be elevated to this level.

The Quiet Girl opens in select Canadian cities on Friday, March 3, 2023.