David R. Walker

Four Letters of Love

Director: Polly Steele

Cast: Pierce Brosnan, Helena Bonham Carter, Gabriel Byrne, Donal Finn, Fionn O’Shea, Ann Skelly, Ferdia Walsh-Peelo

Running Time: 2 hours and 5 minutes

Film Rating: 7 out of 10

British director Polly Steele directs a magic realist love story set in Ireland in the early 1970’s in the film adaptation of the novel by Niall Williams entitled Four Letters of Love.

This quirky Irish film has a solid supporting cast including Oscar nominee Helena Bonham Carter (The Wings of a Dove, The King’s Speech), Pierce Brosnan and Gabriel Byrne but it is the young stars who shine in this uneven tale of forgotten chances, artistic temperaments, mistakes and miracles.

Four Letters of Love focuses on the lives of two young people, Nicholas Coughlin played by the dashing star Fionn O’Shea and the headstrong Isabel Gore wonderfully played by Ann Skelly.

As Nicholas and Isabel’s lives almost cross on a bus one afternoon, it is their families that force fate to intervene and eventually the two meet at the home of Isobel’s eccentric parents beautifully played by Helena Bonham Carter and her father the poet played by Gabriel Byrne.

Nicholas’s family circumstances are somewhat more complex as his father William Coughlin well played by Pierce Brosnan decides to chuck in his work as a civil servant to rather go painting in the West of Ireland leaving Nicholas’s mother to have a nervous breakdown and the young man to fend for himself. Soon Nicholas follows his father to the remote part of Western Ireland and the artistic temperaments earn his father a formidable painting which is put up as first prize in a community poetry competition ironically won by Isabel’s father Muiris Gore.

Gabriel Byrne is perfect as the brooding poet who is angry with God for allowing his young strapping son to have a stroke and is battling to deal with his headstrong daughter. Isabel defies the nuns and soon meets a wastrel of a young man Peader played by Ferdia Walsh-Peelo (CODA, Sing Street).

Four Letters of Love only takes off in the second half of the film and while the odd touches of magic realism in the story generally confuse the narrative as opposed to clarifying it, director Polly Steele allows some scenes to linger too long and only realizes that she has such a talented actress as Helena Bonham Carter in her film, breathing life into her character only towards the end.

As Nicholas accidentally meets Isabel and her poet father and crafty mother, Four Letters of Love is a bizarre Irish film which is both charming and confusing at times.

Unfortunately this Irish film is not a touch on the Oscar nominated Banshees of Inisherin but it is worth seeing. Four Letters of Love is a quirky romantic drama held together by two strong performances by Fionn O’Shea and Ann Skelly.

Four Letters of Love gets a film rating of 7 out of 10 and is recommended viewing for those that enjoy obscure Irish cinema. Good to see Pierce Brosnan in so many films again.

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