Small things like these – a preview

Posted on 8th February 2025

Anyone used to seeing Cillian Murphy head up the Birmingham underworld, or run for his life chased by zombies, or invent the atomic bomb, is in for a shock as he brings to the screen the understated, melancholic portrait of an ordinary man faced with an extraordinary moral dilemma.

Based on Claire Keegan’s superb novel, thsi film adaptation repeatedly emphasises that this is no Dickensian folk tale. With Dangermouse on the telly and a Rubik’s cube for sale in the toyshop, we are reminded that the scandal of the Ireland’s notorious Magdalene Laundries happened within living memory. Murphy plays Bill, a coalman in County Wexford in the early 80s. A soft-spoken, introspective man, both his business and his children’s education relies on the grace of the church, something his conscious wrestles with from the outset because he delivers coal to one of the Laundries – a nightmarishly cruel home for girls that the local community determinably turn a blind eye to. 

Admirers of the book might well be perplexed by the slow, largely wordless build up in the first half hour, before the horrors that confront Bill start to take their toll on both Bill and his marriage, inexorably make the film a difficult, yet ultimately richly rewarding experience. Although we want the imprisoned girls to be avenged – and for Bill to be their avenger – this is far too intelligent a film of offer up such a simplistic resolution. What it does to, fittingly, is value simple acts of kindness and recognise they can be just as brave as grand gestures. If faced with otherwise doing nothing, the film tells us, better at least to do small things like these.