Luigi Mangione and widespread wrath with the 1% are what this deft and formally ambitious Irish film instantly brings to mind. In using the mockumentary form to recount the radicalisation and eventual crimes of brothers Seán and Freddie Halpin (Paul St Leger and Alex Eydt), it creates haunting intrigue about their motives, and further layers on a lyrical indignation that strongly marks out Sau Dachi’s debut feature.
Interviews with lovers, friends, colleagues and the authorities who later intervened, as well as faux archive footage, chronicle the dark descent of the fusional Halpin siblings; on the surface they are bright and artistically gifted jack-the-lads, deeper down traumatised by the loss of their mother to botched cervical cancer treatment. Séan, in particular, internalises this as a consequence of capitalism’s disregard for the little people – and focuses his ire on politician Paul Keogh (William Morgan), the brave-new-world-proselytising Minister for Change and Reform.
