Reading the Inexplicable in "The Banshees of Inisherin"

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What is it that you want to avoid even if you have to cut off your own fingers?
What is it that you can burn down a person's house and still not forgive them?
"The Banshees of Inisherin" is the latest film from "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri" director Martin McDonagh.
It is a film that pulls at your thoughts long after you have seen it.
I would like to summarize in writing the discrepancies and emotional movements I felt after watching the film.
Mainly, "Did you insulate yourself because of how little time you have left in your life?" "What could have happened to you that you would lose your fingers and your home?" "The catchphrase is misleading."
 I would like to write about three main points: Please note that it contains spoilers.


■ Is it because of the time remaining?

The story begins with Colm (Brendan Gleeson) telling Pádric (Colin Farrell) that he is going to leave him.
The two best friends had been drinking together in a bar yesterday, but Colm tells Pádric, "Don't talk to me, don't get close to me," without giving a reason.
Pádric did not understand the reason for the fight and thought it was a joke, but Colm declared that he would cut off his own finger and smash it against the door of your house every time he spoke to him from now on, which he could not understand.
Pádric wanted to know why, so he asked Colm.
Colm told Pádric, "It's because you're a boring man. I'm going to spend the rest of my life doing music, and I'm not going to have anything to do with you.
Then Colm really did cut off the index finger of his left hand and smashed it against the door of Pádric's house.
Pádric, increasingly confused by the unusual behavior, took the reaction and advice of those around him and attacked Colm, who described it as "the funniest thing I've ever done," and as a result, Colm cut off all the fingers of his left hand and smashed them all against the door.

With the gist of the story in mind, we return to the question posed at the beginning.
What kind of situation would you want to avoid by losing all the fingers of your left hand?
Colm, who is supposed to be calm at all times in the story, cuts off his own precious fingers, which he said he wanted to spend his time composing and performing. He remains calm afterwards and goes about his daily life without feeling the pain of his finger, so when you watch the film, you forget the seriousness of the loss of his finger, and it becomes difficult to understand.
Therefore, it is tempting to accept the reasons for the insulation as they are told quietly.
However, when I thought about it, I felt that it was contradictory to cut off a finger that is used for playing.
In fact, there must have been a bigger reason.
Unfortunately, no other reason was given in the work.
So, let me think about it as if it were me.
What do I really want to avoid? If you had to cut off your finger for something you absolutely wanted to protect, what would it be?
For example, for my parents, siblings, friends, or loved ones. For something larger (faith-observance or preventing the collapse of society). On the other hand, I could also think of reasons why I would rather have my finger cut off than have my entire arm cut off for something more diminutive.
When I think of the implications of the insulation declaration, which are equivalent to these, Colm's thoughts become more and more incomprehensible.

He is the kind of person who, even after his declaration of insulation, would help Pádric up when he was hit by a policeman and hit the policeman back.
If he disliked Pádric, he would not help him up, but would ignore him or spit on him. But Colm doesn't seem to dislike him.
I was stuck with one answer to this behavior that only Colm himself could understand or accept: "I'd cut off my fingers to avoid him, but I don't hate him.
I was stuck with one answer: "There is no reason to begin with that is understandable.

To live peacefully in the small community of Inichelin Island, it is of course important to maintain human relationships.
But if there is a belief that one has to break it, the answer is not in the small community, but outside it.
Colm goes to church, but he does not seem to be religious, arguing with the priest.
He is acting this way because of something bigger than the community or religion.
This is the most satisfying way to think about it.


■ Hand slapping from the side that lost their fingers and their home.

Colm's behavior, which may have far-reaching reasons that no one but the person concerned can understand, causes events that Colm himself did not anticipate.
Pádric's donkey, the love of his life, accidentally swallowed Colm's finger and died.
Colm expresses his heartfelt condolences to the grief-stricken Pádric, but Pádric's anger does not abate and he announces that he will set fire to Colm's house at 14:00, the time they usually went to the bar. Pádric, knowing that Colm was in the house, set the fire as he declared.

On the mainland, which can be seen from Inichelin Island, there is a never-ending civil war with daily bombardments.
Pádric also declared war on Corum.
Colm, on the other hand, understands Pádric's grief and proposes a truce, saying, "Let's call it off," even though his house is burned to the ground and he is about to be burned to death.
But Pádric, transformed from a dull man, refuses, and the story closes with the suggestion that their relationship will only intensify in the future.

Colm also behaved in an incomprehensible manner here.
He was set on fire in his own home, showed no signs of escaping, and was nearly killed.
We can surmise from this that he was lying about his reason for wanting to spend the rest of his life doing music.
And Colm, who had lost the fingers of his left hand and his house, suggested to the person he was trying to kill, "Let's call it quits.
It is as if he respects Pádric's wishes and mourns with him the death of the donkey.
I would like to replace this part of the story with my own.
In what situation would you be able to say to someone, "I'll take care of it with this" even though your house is about to be burned down and you are about to be killed?
If it were me, if I received a large sum of money, I would be able to say, "Let bygones be bygones. I have lost even my fingers. If I didn't get something it wouldn't convince me.
And yet, Colm proposed to end the war with the loss of his fingers and his home.
I still didn't understand why he wanted nothing to do with Pardrick to that extent.
It is understandable that the person who set the house on fire can no longer be called a close friend, but Colm does not even seem to be angry about the arson.

I don't understand Colm's behavior. However, his character, as we have seen so far, is trustworthy.
Along with the incomprehensible confusion caused by this cinematic direction, Just as the outbreak of war and the beginning of Russia's military invasion of Ukraine are incomprehensible.
I strongly understood that the world is too complicated and absurd for me to understand.

■ The discomfort of the catchphrase

Based on the above, I would like to consider the catchphrase of this film.
The Japanese version is "Everything was fine, until yesterday. The original version is "everything was fine yesterday.
Both suggest a big difference between before yesterday and after today.
Everything was fine" and "everything was fine" would normally be Pádric's gaze.
So what if Colm feels the same way?
Yesterday, as before, he was at the bar drinking and chatting with Pádric and the rest of his drinking buddies.
But today is different.
Colm, like Pádric, may not have understood the cause of the insulation as well as Pádric, and may have just been visited by the feeling that he had to insulate himself. Along with the determination to cut off his fingers.
For Colm, who does not dislike Pardrick, the gentle Colm may have thought about how to get Pardrick to accept his insulation. As a result, he may have inspired the act of hurting himself. He would not have thought of a way to insulate himself by hurting Pádric.
Self-harm is a violation of Christianity, and it is something that Pádric would want to avoid, as he would consider Colm to be his best friend.
However, things did not turn out the way Colm wanted and the donkey died. As a result, for Colm, he lost his house and his fingers, and for Pardrick, he was guilty of the mortal sin of being an arsonist. In this light, it is possible that he escaped being burned to death not because he did not want to die, but rather so that Pádric would not have to bear the guilt of the murder.
The theme that the deeds of this world are never as we wish them to be was also depicted in the previous film "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri".
I would like to summarize the film in light of these.


■ Summary

I don't think the reason for Colm's insulation is because Pardrick is a boring guy.
And "Everything was going well, until yesterday." I think that this is what happened not only to Pádric but also to Colm himself.
The world is not today as it was yesterday.
We do not know who it will happen to.
Unintelligible events will happen to me one day, inexplicably, and never in the way I wish.
In the previous film, "Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri" two people who would never understand each other somehow understood each other and felt a connection of souls. It is the kind of ending that allows us to find hope in the midst of the absurdity of this world.
On the other hand, "The Banshees of Inisherin" is like an antagonistic structure: both see the same world and have similar experiences, but one offers to insulate the other, and the other declares that he will always be revengeful.
The unreasonableness of having to hurt each other despite being able to understand each other.
I felt again that this is a very sad film.