The Guard (2011)
Spoilers ahead.
Movie rating: 8/10
A self-aware riff on the buddy cop formula, The Guard follows Sgt. Gerry Boyle (Brendan Gleeson), a combative officer in the Garda Síochána (Irish police force), and uptight FBI agent Wendell Everett (Don Cheadle) as they take on drug traffickers in the Connemara district, located in the west of Ireland.
Boyle is the primary focus of the film, written and directed by John Michael McDonagh. In his idiosyncrasies and through Gleeson’s performance, Boyle manages to transcend the standard archetype of the movie cop who plays by his own rules but gets results. The sergeant regularly consumes alcohol and drugs on duty and is a frequent client of sex workers. He’s profane and likes to rile people up. But there’s a sadness at his core, driven by the terminal illness of his mother Eileen (Fionnula Flannagan) and a general disdain for life, as when he suggests another character wouldn’t have committed suicide because they aren’t “that smart.”
The film is full of witty dialogue and what I can only describe as observational comedy, as characters interrogate many of the clichés of movies about cops and criminals. Some of the best come from English trafficker Clive Cornell (Mark Strong, as usual cast as a villain), as when he hands over a briefcase of money to bribe police:
Gerry Stanton: [while Clive Cornell is handing the bent coppers a briefcase of money] It's all there, yeah?
Clive Cornell: Excuse me?
Gerry Stanton: It's all there?
Clive Cornell: No, it's not. I've skimmed a couple of grand off the top.
Gerry Stanton: What?
Clive Cornell: 'Course it's fucking all there. This is the pay-off, yeah? We pay you off, you and your pals keep your fucking noses out of our business. That's the dynamic in this situation. Why the fuck would I then cheat you out your money? Eh? Why would I do that? That doesn't make any sense. That'd defeat the entire purpose of the fucking interaction. Fuck me! [walks away angrily]
Boyle mocks fellow cops for Americanisms, as when his young Dublin partner says, “I’m on it, sarge.” Boyle mutters in response, “He thinks he’s in fuckin’ Detroit.”
Another favourite moment is when Boyle shoots trafficker Liam O’Leary (David Wilmot), who had been holding him at gunpoint. Usually cop movies in the action genre, such as Hard Boiled, show police killing scores of henchmen without much pause or comment. Giving the dying villain a moment to ponder his regrets in life is not only funny in comparison, but more realistic in letting us consider what most people might be thinking in our final moments. It also gives us another revealing character moment showing Boyle’s acerbic and nihilistic attitude:
Sergeant Gerry Boyle: Are the lights growing dim?
Liam O'Leary: Don't mock me.
Sergeant Gerry Boyle: It's good enough for ya.
Liam O'Leary: There's so many... so many things I wanted to do.
Sergeant Gerry Boyle: Like what for fuck's sake? Running with the bulls at Pamplona?
In general I’m a little tired of the countless movies and TV shows that centre around police officers, FBI and CIA agents, etc. as the protagonists. But by the climactic shootout of this movie, scored to acoustic guitars that evoke Ennio Morricone’s spaghetti Western music, I accepted that so long as the state exists, movies and TV shows will continue to fixate on individuals from the “special bodies of armed men” who defend existing property relations, which is what the state amounts to in the last analysis. Westerns are a good example: given the time and place they depict, the genre will inevitably dwell on conflicts between outlaws and lawmen. So it is with action, comedies, dramas, and any other genre set in contemporary society.
Given that, The Guard is a funny and occasionally touching movie that both follows and critiques the basic buddy cop template. The setting in the west of Ireland gives the film a bit more personality compared to Hollywood fare I’m more used to. Upon its release The Guard became the highest-grossing Irish independent film of all time based on box office results in Ireland, surpassing The Wind That Shakes the Barley (a masterwork of a film that’s a solid 10/10 for me). More interesting than your average cop flick and efficiently told at a brisk 93 minutes, it’s a fun watch.