One night when I was 16 years old, I went to a small gathering with my friends. On the car ride there I was told my friends sister (we’ll call her Lara) would be there. This had me feeling nervous.. partly because she was older than us (21) and partly because I’d heard a lot of wild things about her. As the night went on it got to a point where I was left alone with Lara. I was drunk…

Going into this I expected it to be a tale of sprawling feeling. After all it takes place over several time periods and those types of stories are usually told to emulate the cosmicity of a life lived. But it’s not that. The Irishman is about a life of unfeeling. Acts of vengeance are stripped of gratification and replaced with awkward brutality, all death is unreconciled and treated as nothing more than a chess move, allegiances undertaken & your perception of…

Definitely understand people’s criticisms of the chessboard/utilitarian progression of this movie. Things falling perfectly into place etc etc but It works for me. I don’t see it as an authorly orchestration designed to inflict misery on unknowing characters. The premise is actually quite dependent on intervention by its characters, which grants an in-text purpose for all of the self conscious uniformity happening. An elaborate plan to attain social mobility in a system designed to exploit lower class individuals. Even when…