Drive It Like You Stole It: ‘Sing Street’ Takes on Imagination, Growing Up, and Family
“Time is an amorphous blob,” remarked my best friend as we mused together about this bizarre year. Like many young adults with anxiety, we are perplexed about how time tends to stand still for us while somehow chugging along in the outside world. We take the days as they come and ground ourselves in the tangible and immediate, in things that don’t feel exhausting to look forward to. Although it feels disingenuous to dream about anything, I sometimes find myself entertaining big hopes until I feel uncomfortable with my lack of solutions. Or I avoid thinking about said hopes altogether in favor of watching something that makes me happy.
Recently, I rewatched John Carney’s Sing Street, one of my favorite films. Each time I watch it, I wish I had been able to do so ten years ago because its protagonist Conor is everything I was and everything I wished I could be. In this viewing, I was especially struck by the imagination and conviction of teenagers that persists even during difficult circumstances.
When Conor’s parents move him to a tough all-boys inner-city school to cut back on costs during a recession, he is almost instantly marked as different. It is so difficult to exist, forget thrive, in an environment that’s just not the right fit. But by the second day, we see that Conor is ready to find ways to make things work for himself. He notices Raphina, an aspiring model, standing outside the school. To impress her, he asks if she’d like to be in a video for his rock band (at this point, his closest encounter with a band is watching MTV). After she reluctantly agrees, he enlists the help of his enterprising new friend Darren to assemble a motley crew of teenage boys-fellow school outcasts-to form Sing Street. Over time, the group cultivates a sweet camaraderie as they find their sound and feed a passion that makes them happy. Mentored and supported by his older brother Brendan, Conor learns more about music and himself.
Growing up is hard. Conor has a lot on his plate: a heart-stopping love interest, family turmoil, two school bullies (including the headmaster, Brother Baxter), and rigid gender norms. And yet, he persists with his commitment to Raphina along with his band, their fun music, and kitschy videos-a reprieve from the turbulent parts of his life. While he doesn’t ignore the harsh truths of his life, he isn’t dissuaded from trying to find better things.
When Raphina asks Conor to write her a happy song, he wonders, “what if I don’t feel happy?”Without missing a beat, she tells him, “your problem is that you’re not happy being sad, but that’s what love is: happy-sad.” Meaning, as Brendan later explains, it is important to reach a place in your life where you’re okay with your sadness. Doing what he does best, he hands Conor a record, this time by The Cure (“they’re happy-sad”), to help him make sense of this. Conor comes to understand that being stuck in a bad place is a part of life. To deal with that means accepting it and continuing to make art. What amazes me most about Conor is that he accepts adversity but doesn’t allow it to bring his hopes to a halt. I hope that I too can embrace being happy-sad and allow myself to feel, try, and imagine, all in my own time.
Imagination is at the heart of Sing Street, which toes the line between reality and fantasy. About the ending, director John Carney said, “When you are caught up in your own drama, there is a sort of magical realism — particularly when you’re young — about what’s happening. You fill in the visuals in your head, slightly. I wanted to capture that, but I didn’t want to qualify anything at the end or tell the audience how they should think or feel. I wanted them to almost experience it like a video in a way.” Though the magical realism Carney refers to is clearest in the prom sequence (‘Drive It Like You Stole It’) and the ending, there is a subtler kind that weaves the entire story together. Conor is aware of his life and its real struggles, but whether it’s songs, video ideas, gigs, fashion-he is always looking for possibilities. He focuses on the magic that does exist in his world: potential.
As a teenager, I thought of magical realism as a set of ideas confined to the pages of books, detached from who I was. Bound by a grades-driven system, I had trouble connecting the dots between schoolwork and real-life. Years later, Sing Street showed me that magical realism is at the heart of the teenage experience. Teenagers have a unique affinity for trying to find wonder in everyday life. Playing out scenarios in their heads, including implausible ones, is a part of doing what they can to make the tough parts of their lives easier to deal with.
I spent a great deal of time daydreaming about things getting better at school without actually being able to change things; rebellion is not a viable option for many teenagers. When Conor falls, he picks himself back up rather than buckling to societal pressure. During the school disco, he proudly presents ‘Brown Shoes’ as a song about “every bully you ever knew.” As he sings, “You try to shut me up, I’ll turn the volume up and drown you out,” I listen in awe, remembering that my response to being shut down by anyone was shrinking, mostly. This year has reminded me of what it is like to feel small.
Conor is who I could have been if I wasn’t so scared to fight the wave, instead existing in survival mode. I tried to conform to the unrelenting cultural norms and education system, neither of which ever seemed to fit me. I turned to friends, crushes, and art for answers that I never found. Lacking Conor’s pluck, I couldn’t confront my bullies, neither classmates nor teachers. I’m grateful I had a couple of friends who, like me, kept their heads down to bide their time until graduation. Unfortunately, we did not have supportive family members to encourage us despite our failings and to remind us that there was more to come, that we had time.
Sing Street is as much a story about brothers as it is about imagination. It is about Conor’s relationship with his older brother Brendan, his biggest critic, his loudest cheerleader, and an essential part of his journey growing up. It’s refreshing that Brendan has no resentment toward Conor despite his status as a college dropout, stoner, and resident loser of the family. Time and again, he puts his well wishes for Conor above all else, focusing on Conor and his music, and not saying much about himself-often a part of being an older sibling.
We get our only glimpse of Brendan feeling angry about who he is when he opens up to Conor in the film’s rawest moment, “You’re the youngest. You get to follow the path that I macheted through the jungle that is our mad family…you followed the path that I cut for us. Untouched. You just moved in my jet stream.”
I understand how difficult it is to cut the path when you have to tread on shaky ground. To set an example, you must meet a set of standards. Where my passions and school were like oil and water, my brother was good at everything-music, sports, and academics. Egged on by family and society, I majored in something I felt lukewarm about (at best), changing my mind three years into college. It took me quite some time to find my footing in the things I was culturally supposed to be good at. As a kid, I resented my brother because I was convinced that everyone, including my parents, liked him better. Over the years as we grew closer and I became more sure of myself, the resentment was replaced by fondness and a strong desire to protect him from a lot of what I went through.
Brendan holds onto the same silver lining as I did: the responsibility he feels to look out for his younger brother and help him suffer less. Like Conor’s bandmates and many young people in ’80s era Ireland, Brendan believes that the future there is bleak, and encourages Conor to work towards getting off the island. Though he can be pretentious and abrasive, his passion for rock music is unrivaled, and he wants to share as much knowledge as he can with Conor. He doesn’t want Conor to ever think that his dreams are out of reach, especially as his own didn’t materialize. So he feverishly shows him videos and shares record on record (“ this is school”) as homework for him and Sing Street. Cautioning against becoming a covers band, Brendan insists that “rock and roll is a risk — you risk being ridiculed.” Sing Street certainly takes risks, trying on something different every week. Together, Conor and Brendan marvel at the music that becomes the basis for the band’s many attempts to find their sound.
Though Brendan takes Conor’s feelings seriously, he also encourages him to see people for who they are, not who he wants them to be. Part of the magical realism of being young is building someone up in your head. Referring to a song he wrote about Raphina, Conor says, “When you don’t know someone, they’re more interesting. They can be anything you want them to be. But when you know them, there’s limits.”
Though there’s no doubt Conor adores Raphina, to the point of considering her a muse, he is aware of her struggles, thanks to her bluntness and Brendan’s frequent reality checks. And Raphina is intentional about how she presents herself, keeping most people at arm’s length. Unlike Conor, she is careful not to offer up any information or consider any reality that would leave her vulnerable. She wears impeccable outfits and makeup, always seeming put together and confident. Despite not having a lot of experience with modeling, her resolve about making it big in London doesn’t waver.
Modeling in London is such a certain trajectory for her; “almost like part of her identity,” as Conor observed. She shares Conor’s dedication to art, once forcefully telling him, “You can never do anything by half.” So her eventual failure breaks her sense of self-she dresses plainly and pretends to be someone else when Conor sees her back in Dublin. This reminds me that teenagers understand a lot more than people think they do. It’s easier to cope by framing situations in ways that hurt less, including trying to hide or change who you are.
We like to think of people we love in certain ways because accepting their flaws can mean coming to terms with things we don’t like. We’re encouraged to focus on “the best” in people as if love means ignoring flaws and tensions. It is far easier to tune out and imagine better possibilities than to face people constantly at war with each other. Conor isn’t ready to accept his parents’ failings yet so he fixates on music, something he can rely on. It can take a pivotal moment or a series of moments to push people to realize that no one is infallible, not even parents. After Conor and his sister Ann hear a particularly bad shouting match between their parents, they open their doors to see what’s going on. They look at each other with sad resignation and retreat to Brendan’s room, where they dance to music that muffles the sound of their parents’ marriage breaking a little more. As Conor plays drums in the air, Brendan tells him, “This is life, Conor. Drive it like you stole it.”
When their parents call a family meeting to announce their separation, Conor finally snaps, “This is bullshit.” Up till this point, he had ignored not only Brendan’s speculations about their mother having an affair but also her admitting it to their father during the shouting match. Brendan, on the other hand, believes it was a matter of time and thanks their parents for finally separating. When their mother says she understands this is upsetting, his usual dry sarcasm is replaced by visceral anger as he exclaims, “you don’t understand anything!”
In private, Conor tells Brendan he was right and Brendan replies, “They’re just human beings, I told you that.” Conor looks dismayed-he wanted his parents to come to his gig at the end of the month. Despite his parents’ lack of involvement in his life, he was holding out hope that they might put aside their problems to be there for him. Much to Conor’s surprise, Brendan lashes out at him, “What, you thought they’d become different people? Noticing what you’re doing and what you wanted? They’ve got their own shit going on, they’re not going to your stupid gig.” Brendan is also agitated because he has quit smoking, so he can do something with his life. Conor doesn’t take him seriously, which is a real slap in the face for Brendan. “Like what?” Conor asks, scoffing. Ouch. After taking a moment, Brendan shares his own frustrations about their parents, his life, and the things he used to be good at.
To me, Brendan represents the shattering of the innocence and hopes that Conor can afford, something that comes with age and plans not going right. But in helping Conor, Brendan gets something amazing in return: a reminder that he can imagine more for himself. A few scenes later, Conor sees Brendan outside the house soaking in the sun, and apologizes for not knowing about “his guitar playing and everything.” He invites Brendan to play a solo at the school disco because it’s been a while since he left the house. Brendan smiles up at the sky and retorts, “Well, I’m out here, aren’t I?” For him, that’s a start.
Seeing Conor off before he sails away with Raphina, Brendan hands Conor a sheet of lyrics he wrote about “this kid and this girl in the future”; perhaps Conor and his band can put some music to it. He tells Conor, “I wish I would’ve done this.” After the boat departs, we see each brother’s point of view as they look back at each other. As Brendan sees the boat getting smaller, he cheers and jumps, punching his fist in the air. The ballad playing in the background says, “no going back now” Maybe he won’t go back either, and isn’t that everything?
It is a lot to make your way through life when you’re still figuring things out and can’t always exercise your agency. Recent years have been stormy for me, and like Brendan, I’d forgotten what it is to imagine better possibilities. I am grateful to Conor for reminding me that I can still do so. The possibility of sailing, though distant, still exists.
As the band heads home after recording a music video by the harbor, Conor and Raphina lag behind the others. Pausing for a moment, Conor points to the sea and tells Raphina that on a clearer day, the mainland of Britain is just about visible. He can’t see it right then, but he knows it’s on the horizon, as many things can be.
Originally published on our WordPress website on September 16, 2020.
