Once upon a time there was a "guy" and a "girl." The unnamed boyishly handsome Guy (Glen Hansard) meets the beautiful Girl (Marketa Irglova) while playing for coins on the streets of Dublin. The Guy earns his living in his father's vacuum cleaner repair shop and writes and plays music on the side. The Girl is an immigrant from the Czech Republic and a trained pianist in desperate need of vacuum cleaner repair in this Academy Award winning (Best Original Song) modern musical.
Guy and Girl develop a relationship around music. With tolerant permission from the owner, she plays occasionally at a music store, and there Guy teaches her "Falling Slowly." It is a beautiful song with a simple, but stirring melody and poignant lyrics. Their two characters are a study in contrasts as well. Her voice is quiet, barely imposing itself on the ear, while his strong vocals and soaring falsetto deliver the lyrics as a cannon might. But their voices complement each other in a way that produces a towering and tragic and stirring performance.
Tender moments are plentiful as are humorous and some awkward moments, one at least punctuated by Guy's invitation to Girl to stay the night. He later finds out that she has a child and a husband who still lives in the Czech Republic. She left her husband because she felt he did not understand her, that her life had been too constricted and had moved forward too quickly. She claimed her independence in order to find her own way. She lives with her mother in a working class section of the city. Their apartment building has no telephone and only one television shared by all in the building. Girl earns a living by selling flowers on the street and getting odd jobs as a housekeeper.
Meeting Guy and being reintroduced not just to playing music but to creating music is something of a turning point. One day Guy gives her a CD he has burned with a melody he wrote but cannot put words to and asks her to write the lyrics. The words come to her in a flood, but the battery in the portable CD player has died. After scrounging through the house for new batteries, Girl breaks into her daughter piggy bank and runs down the street to the corner store to buy new batteries in her pajamas. In this scene, we see her walking home listening to the CD player and singing the words she has just penned. "If you want me," she sings, "satisfy me." Irglova's is a soft but inspired performance.
One day, Guy has a brilliant plan. The two will record a demo CD, and he will take it to London in search of a record deal. Through the force of her personality and her belief in his talent, Girl helps him secure a bank loan in order to pay for studio space. They bring along three other street musicians and the journey to music history is begun.
Beautiful songs like "And the Healing has Begun," "Falling Slowly," "If You Want Me," "Gold," and "When Your Mind's Made Up" punctuate the different stages of the subtle plot. Indeed, the story itself is driven by the music more than vice versa.
Once there was an idea for a movie that had never been done before and to which there can be no sequel. This is that movie. Put it at the top of your queue on Netflix today.
