Tim Mielants directs Cillian Murphy, Eileen Walsh and Emily Watson in this Irish drama where a quiet family man is disturbed by the harsh cruelty everyone seemingly turns a blind eye to around his home town.

A deceptively simple character study that wordlessly dripfeeds us ‘everything’ without telling us much. The way we enter Bill’s viewpoint without ever explicitly hearing him put his growing dismay into words is profoundly powerful. Almost more engaging for being stoic. The ending will frustrate some viewers, it ends where many movie’s second acts would only begin. But we know what a tough road he has chosen to go down and even deciding on a course of action is the victory in the face of communal apathy and hopelessness. Emily Watson is believably terrifying in this. Maybe they should have saved her for just that one big scene?

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Perfect Double Bill: The Magdalene Sisters (2002)