Colin Farrell and Brendan Gleeson's reunion has been a long time coming.
Ever since they shared the big screen in Martin McDonagh's 2008 cult classic In Bruges, the pair have shared a lasting friendship, but they haven't starred together again – until now.
"Martin's the Pied Piper. We were just waiting 14 years for the tune to be played," Farrell told ABC News Breakfast, before Gleeson cut him off as they shared some laughs – "We're the rats!"
Such is the pair's dynamic, although this time around, they're far better friends off-screen than on.
The Banshees of Inisherin places the duo on an Irish island in the early 1920s at a major impasse – Gleeson's character, Colm, has decided he no longer wants to be friends with Farrell's, Pádraic.
The critics have seen it as a winning formula, as it's leading the recently announced Golden Globes nominations with a whopping eight nods — including Best Picture (Musical of Comedy), Best Director and Best Actor.
Not bad for a black comedy about a platonic break-up.
Friendship fallout
Banshees takes viewers to a cold and isolated stretch of land in the Irish isles, in the middle of the Irish Civil War right after the establishment of the Irish Free State.
War's raging on the mainland, but Inisherin serves as an oasis of sorts — the locals there really couldn't care less about the fighting.
It's there we find lifelong friends Pádraic and Colm — but that all changes when Colm wants out.
Pádraic resolves to fix the friendship, but that only hardens Colm's stance, escalating the tension.
"I'm not sure what the film says about it, apart from trying to show it truthfully," director Martin McDonagh told ABC News Breakfast about the break-up we see on-screen, and how it might be influenced by depression and loneliness.
"Definitely, 100 years ago in Ireland, you're not going to over-analyse that or think about it — but it would've been there back then too, even if they might not have had a word for it."
Even though Pádraic's friendship with Colm was in tatters, at least Farrell had a donkey to lean on.
"Jenny the donkey, there's a tale there – ba-boom," Farrell said.
"I didn't get a sense that she understood the 'music' of Martin's writing — but she was divine.
"She'd arrive on the set, and it was like C-3PO in the Ewok village … I loved working with her.
"I wouldn't do it again in a hurry, but I loved working with her," he added, amid Gleeson's rapturous laughter.
The McDonagh effect
Martin McDonagh's most recent film before this one – Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri – won a slew of awards including Oscars, Golden Globes, SAGs and BAFTAs.
But it's a lesser-acclaimed cult classic from 2008 that carries more weight in the context of Banshees.
"I had such a glorious time doing In Bruges 14 years ago, it's still just indelible in my memory," Farrell said.
The film starred Farrell and Gleeson as Irish hit men in hiding in the titular Belgian city, before one is asked to turn on the other.
A bit of humour, a bit of darkness, a lot of humanity – all hallmarks of McDonagh's work.
"I think most of my stuff has that sadness and humour hand in hand," he said.
"But working with him [McDonagh], it's not precious," Gleeson said.
"It's inspired, and earned, and worked on to the extent where I do find the rhythms [in his scripts] are immediate in the reading of them, even. It's almost musical, in a way."
"It's an utter joy to create with this fellow [Gleeson] and with Martin," Farrell said.
"To just again experience the horror, and the feeling, and the hilarity, and the meaning it's impossible not to glean from Martin's writing, it was honestly a dream."
