Pretty Good

In truth, there is barely enough story here to make a film.

The film creates a perfect balance between action and depth of basic needs, in the midst of an infertile atmosphere.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

(Flash Review)Why was this a special feature on the Three Billboard DVD? It was deranged. Taking place on a train, two unrelated passengers have had a significant loss in their family. Along comes some demented and highly irritating Irish young man. He hassles the mourning mother enough that she does something highly rash! The train is stopped to investigate the event. Later we learn the police are after this annoying young man. Cue bloodbath. This film had no redeeming value.

Martin McDonagh begins the story as a middle-aged man learns of his wife's death. He takes a train to Dublin, Ireland where he encounters a troubled young man and a couple in despair. There is a lot of death and despair in this short film even by today's standards. THere is a lot of needless violence and destruction especially with the cow and innocent white rabbit. The middle-aged man's encounter with the young man is troubling. The kid makes rude and insensitive comments to the young couple who lost their son the night before. There is a lot of death in this short film. Martin McDonagh is a promising and accomplished playwright and director. This short film was included on the dvd of "Three Billboards"

SIX SHOOTER was an infuriating film for me, though judging by the fact that it won the Oscar for Best Live Action Short, I assume I must be in the minority. What I found infuriating was that the film seemed so uneven and didn't seem to stay within a genre. One minute, it was a very sad drama, the next it was a bit of a comedy and back and forth it went. I've seen others describe it as a black comedy but there just wasn't enough to laugh at or enough irony for me to see it as this style film. I like my humor dark, but this just wasn't even funny--it was just rather nihilistic.The movie begins with a man at the hospital learning that his wife had died. Soon, he's on a train and it seems that several around him have also just lost family. A bizarre and ugly-spirited young man's mother just died and he seems pretty happy about it. A couple is coping with the loss of their baby--and the young guy taunts them about it relentlessly. This all just seemed very cruel and sick. Yet, later in the film, the young guy was talking about heaven and God and this all seemed rather profound--and like it was an entirely different person. To me, to have someone change that much just made little sense and seemed like poor writing. Perhaps they were implying he had a mother issue and hated mothers so much that that is why he was so cruel to the mother on the train, but even this didn't explain him completely. His character just seemed too full of disparities to be realistic.After a while, there is a lot of violence and death on board the train. This, combined with the dark ending, made for a very dark and unsatisfying film and the bad seemed to leave a much bigger impression on me than the good (such as some excellent acting and a few imaginative scenes).By the way, this film is part of the CINEMA 16: European Shorts DVD. On this DVD are 16 shorts. Most aren't great, though because it contains THE MAN WITHOUT A HEAD, COPY SHOP, RABBIT and WASP, it's an amazing DVD for lovers of short films and well worth buying. Also, while it lost to SIX SHOOTER, I recommend you try watching OUR TIME IS UP--it was a very, very clever, insightful and funny short that I wish had won instead (it was THAT good).

Having just lost his wife, Donnelly boards a train through the Irish countryside to return home. He finds himself on a sparsely populated carriage with a young man who won't shut up and appears to be looking just to wind others up, and a couple grieving the lost of their baby from cot death. Within seconds of sitting down, the kid starts talking and soon gets tensions rising in the otherwise quite train carriage.Mere days after it took the Oscar for best short film I took the opportunity to watch this film on Channel 4. A testament to the ongoing work of Film Four, this is a darkly comic film that is bleak and depressing while still providing plenty of laughs. Often "dark comedy" means that a film is just rather film without being funny at all but rather just failing to be taken seriously. However with this film the material is both bleak and intentionally funny at the same time. The plot is exaggerated of course but the writing has enough familiarity to make it engaging and attainable. I can't really describe it very well but the humour is very Irish and I found it funny at the same time as enjoying the brooding nature of what was happening.As writer and director it must be said that McDonagh doesn't do much wrong; producing a great script but also making the film look very professional and washed out at the same time. The cast are all good. Gleeson is of course the star of the piece and he is convincing as he mourns his way through the film. Conroy is the driving force for the majority and is excellent, working with the script really well. He is funny as much as menacing and I couldn't stop watching him. Support from both Wilmot and O'Sullivan is good and a small role for Gleeson Jr is amusing.Overall a strong short film that is worthy of the bigger audience that the Oscar may bring. It is dark but still funny, enjoyable but yet brooding. The writing is very good and the cast all "get it", especially a nicely understated Gleeson and a scene stealing Conroy.