Well, I'm back in Ireland again. It was quite the trip - the curse of Ryanair struck again. For the first time in about two months, I was on the Stansted Express, and thinking to myself how nice that was - and as we were nearly there, the Ryanair Day of Travel Assistant messaged me. Seemed my flight was to be delayed by 1hr 45mins - not two hours, of course, that's when the compensation kicks in. Well, I messaged the guy who was to pick me up, and my mother, and thought, at least I can get something to eat. I was hungry.
So, imagine my surprise to exit security - within an hour of the original flight time - and see on the departure boards that we were to proceed to the gate! which I did. And it wasn't long before we were boarded. Put my case in the overheard compartment, settled in my seat. And then there was an announcement from cabin crew. "Ladies and gentlemen, I believe you got a text to say the flight was delayed." (Well, not a text, but whatever.) "I'm afraid the text was correct - we didn't know about it. You were boarded by mistake." They didn't know what the cause of the delay was.
We had to exit the plane, luggage and all - back up the stairs. And then it seemed we were expected to wait in the tunnel! For an hour or so! until someone complained, and after a few minutes, we were let back out into the departure area. Where, you know, there were seats! and toilets! and vending machines! So, I went to the toilet, and dinner was a few trips to the vending machine. The announcement that they were now reboarding the flight came after I'd joined the queue, and it had started working its way through again - at which point, it finally occurred to someone to get on the tannoy and let people know. Oh, and the cause of the delay? Seems, during routine maintenance, there was one part hadn't been signed off on. So they had to get someone to do that. And then it turned out they needed a new part. So..
Well, as for film, it was like to be The Whale, starring Brendan Fraser in an Oscar-nominated performance as a morbidly obese English teacher, looking to reconnect with his estranged daughter. Funnily enough, I was thinking the Omniplex, as Ennis didn't have a time early enough - but the original listing I saw in the Omniplex was wrong, and they didn't either! So I said I'd head to the Odeon - more expensive, but what can you do?
..Except, yesterday, I checked again - and the Odeon weren't doing the afternoon showing there either! What on earth is going on with these cinemas, that they can't get their stories straight. So.. that was that! I can't take the evening away from my mother. So I had to choose something else, showing in the afternoon. With two horror films equally rated, I thought the better of them sounded like Knock at the Cabin - an M. Night Shayamalan film, in which he has a cameo as a tv presenter, as well as directing and cowriting. Dane Bautista plays one - the leader, if you will - of four strangers that come a-knockin' at the cabin door of a vacationing family. Jonathan Groff is one of the parents staying in the cabin.
So, these aren't just any four old strangers - these are the four horsemen of the apocalypse. Not retaining their original function, mind - and not on horseback either. They are, as they explain, just ordinary folks, chosen for this task, which is to persuade the hapless family on whose vacation they are intruding to sacrifice one of themselves, in order to prevent said Apocalypse. I don't remember there being such a handy get-out clause, but there is the precedent of Sodom and Gomorrah, two awfully sinful cities that God decided to destroy, but said could be spared if one good person could be found..
Now, my mother has a 17th Century bible at home, and when I was a kid, one day I took it upon myself to ease the enormous, heavy thing down from the shelf and read the Book of Revelations. Scared the **** out of myself in the process. It's scary stuff. Now, naturally, the good people in the cabin think this is just a bunch of oddballs - and it's unnerving that they come with weapons (which they call, rather, tools). But - and this isn't a spoiler, it's in the trailer - just wait until the family start to refuse to kill one of themselves. They are told that, every time they say "no", hundreds of thousands of others will die. And they keep turning on the telly, to show it happening..
From the point of view of a horror film, much of this isn't scary. But Shayamalan's vision of the Apocalypse really is, on a profound level. It's very cleverly done, what he shows as the means of apocalypse - very topical, very believable. Some of those images are never going to leave me. What struck me more about the film, though, was the depth of character development. We not only get to know these characters, we get to love them. Which makes the impending disaster all the more terrible. If it's true. With Shayamalan's tendency for last-minute switches, you never can be sure..
It's a really moving film - but approach with caution, as it's just as difficult to watch as any respectable horror film. Oh, and I managed to get a Saver ticket - so this was actually the cheapest ticket I could have got for any of the cinemas!
On a side note, I had cause to visit the adjacent Castletroy Shopping Centre, which has really come along since I last did! I didn't spend much time there, but it looks lovely - restaurants, cafes, bars, a large supermarket, clothes shops.. all you could want, really.
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