Brooklyn: A Stunning Showcase for Saoirse Ronan
When she was only 13, Irish actress Saoirse Ronan made a lasting impression on moviegoers as the calculating Briony Tallis in Atonement. An aspiring novelist with an overactive imagination and an acute sense of jealousy, Briony falsely accuses her older sister’s lover of a crime and alters the course of their lives forever. With a severe blonde bob, wide blue eyes and a combination of mature eloquence and youthful impulsiveness, Ronan was unforgettable in this complex role. Since that auspicious beginning, we’ve been able to watch her grow up onscreen via a mixture of young adult novel adaptations (The Host, How I Live Now), prestige projects (The Lovely Bones, The Grand Budapest Hotel) and even the occasional action thriller (Hanna, Violet and Daisy). Brooklyn, an adaptation of Colm Tóibín’s novel directed by John Crowley (best known for the underrated Irish romantic comedy Intermission), feels like the culmination of her journey from child actor to movie star. As Eilis Lacey, who leaves her homeland of Ireland behind in search of a better life, Ronan transforms from a mousy, homesick girl into a confident, assured young woman over the course of the film. It’s a remarkable performance that anchors this lovely little historical drama.
In Eilis’ Irish hometown in the 1950s, both employment and romantic prospects are thin on the ground for a young woman. So, Eilis’ beloved older sister writes to Father Flood (Jim Broadbent), an Irish priest in America, and asks him to sponsor Eilis’ emigration from Ireland to Brooklyn, New York. Working in a high-end department store with dreams of becoming a bookkeeper and living in a boarding house full of catty young women, the shy, reserved Eilis longs for the familiar comforts of home. However, that changes when she is approached at a dance by Tony (Emory Cohen), a charming Italian-American plumber who is instantly smitten with her brains and beauty. In those first scenes with Tony, one sees Eilis emerge from the cocoon of her homesickness and begin to sparkle; the more time she spends with him, the more Brooklyn actually starts to feel like her home. However, when a tragedy calls her back to Ireland for a visit, Eilis discovers that things have changed there. A good job lands in her lap, and a local man, Jim Farrell (Domhnall Gleeson, who seems to have appeared in every movie in 2015) begins to court her. Torn between her old home and her new one, Eilis must decide which version of life she wants to pursue.
At first, I questioned the easy time that Eilis seemed to have upon landing in the United States; she has a job in a swanky store and a room in a safe boarding house set up for her, and the kindly and generous Father Flood enrolls her in night classes at Brooklyn College. All in all, she’s a pretty privileged immigrant compared to many others. But, with these obstacles out of the way, Eilis’ journey becomes less about the stereotypical challenges of starting a new life in a new land and more about the quintessential challenges of growing up and falling in love. The film does not have much of a plot, simply skipping from moment to moment in Eilis’ life and revealing more and more about her and her desires as it does. She’s an eminently practical woman who does not allow herself to be bossed around by anyone — women or men — and who falls in love at her own pace, without losing sight of her own dreams for the future. Time and time again, Eilis shows strength of character in subtle ways, such as when she accepts a temporary bookkeeping job while in Ireland and tells her employer that she will prepare the books for whoever comes on permanently after she returns to America, repeatedly ignoring his and everyone else’s assumptions that she is back in Ireland to stay. In these moments, it is clear that Brooklyn is less about being an immigrant and more about choosing one’s own future and not letting others do it for you — a coming-of-age problem to which many a young woman (and man) can relate.
The entire cast give stellar performances, but the film is carried on the capable shoulders of Ronan. Crowley makes the wise choice to repeatedly utilize close-ups of his lead’s open, expressive face, allowing her to convey so much with the most subtle changes in expression. It helps that while Ronan is a pretty girl, she is also one who looks real, without that Hollywood gloss that makes many young actresses impossible to identify with. When good things happen to Eilis, you want to hug her; when she makes bad choices, you want to scold her, as you would one of your best friends who made a misguided decision. Ronan makes it easy to be wholeheartedly invested in Eilis, which helps the movie remain engaging even when it drags a bit too slowly. As a director, Crowley does occasionally succumb to cliches, such as the moment when Eilis exits immigration by walking out into a blaze of blinding bright light — heavy-handed symbolism of America’s status as the Promised Land. Credit is due to screenwriter Nick Hornby, a novelist primarily known for “lad lit” like High Fidelity and Fever Pitch. Despite his reputation, those novels represent only a small portion of his varied oeuvre. Indeed, as he has branched out into screenwriting, Hornby has focused on adapting surprisingly female-focused stories, including two other compelling tales of a young woman’s journey of self-discovery, An Education and Wild. In Brooklyn, he demonstrates a keen sense of knowing what it is like to be tempted by the familiarities of one’s childhood while knowing that it is not the life one is meant to lead.
Watching Brooklyn is the moviegoing equivalent of slowly sipping a cup in front of a crackling fire. It warms your heart and makes you feel at home — wherever that may be.
