Ireland’s ‘Closer You Get’: Five Blokes and a Message

“The Closer You Get” is a droll, hearty Irish comedy with a serious undertow all the more effective for its unexpected candor and depth. It was adapted by William Ivory from Herbie Wave’s story and has a wonderfully bemused, compassionate understanding of the woes that can beset the ordinary bloke. Significantly, it was produced by Uberto Pasolini, who produced the mega-hit British comedy “The Full Monty.”

The earlier film was famously concerned with a bunch of laid-off English factory workers driven by desperation to become strippers; in this film, directed by Aileen Ritchie with an astringent sense of humor, Ivory takes a look at the lack of romance in the lives of five men living in a gloriously picturesque village on Ireland’s Donegal coast. That a woman is directing such a male-oriented story gives the film added tension and sharpness; “Closer” marks strong feature debuts for both Ritchie and Ivory.

One night at the local pub, the young butcher Kieran O’Donnagh (Ian Hart), who fancies himself more sophisticated than his peers, persuades his pals to advertise in the Miami Herald--yes, that’s right--inviting eligible young beauties to attend the annual St. Martha’s Day Dance, making it clear that he and his friends are all eligible bachelors--and solvent to boot. Besides Kieran, there’s his older brother Ian (Sean McGinley), a sheepherder; the burly Ollie (Pat Shortt), a 36-year-old virgin still living with his mother; and Sean (Sean McDonagh), the youngest of the group, possibly still in his teens. The pub is owned by former soccer star Pat (Ewan Stewart) and his wife, Kate (Niamh Cusack), ostensibly happily married. Still Pat, the one handsome man in the entire community, not only spruces up his bar but starts working out to get back into top shape.

There’s a hitch in the form of the town’s formidable grocer-postmistress, Mary (Ruth McCabe), who sees nothing wrong in steaming open other people’s mail when it arrives or before she sends it on its way. From the get-go, therefore, Mary sees to it that the women of the village know what Kieran et al are up to. While there’s not a super-abundance of eligible women in the community, there’s not such a drastic shortage that the men have to advertise for companionship. But one of the women observes that sometimes “the closer you get” the more likely you are to overlook what’s right under your nose. In that regard Kieran is completely oblivious to Siobhan (Cathleen Bradley), his pretty but severe assistant, who in turn is put off by his crude ways.

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Like many astute comedies with more than just laughs on its mind, “The Closer You Get” gets more serious as it progresses, even amid a series of amusing situations set off by the men’s plan and the women’s awareness of it. “The Full Monty” made clear--beneath the laughter generated by its unlikely male strippers--that being laid off with little prospect of new employment can be demoralizing. And “Closer” makes clear the soul-withering prospect of a loveless existence.

If politics and economics are the villains of the “Monty” plot, “Closer” implies unmistakably that Roman Catholicism’s puritanical tradition, which tends to set the flesh and the spirit at war, plays a pivotal part in keeping many of the villagers emotionally crippled, as well as sexually frustrated. Indeed, by the end of the film the village’s young priest (Risteard Cooper), though not exactly a radical, is nudging his flock in directions that surely would not sit well with the Vatican. The film is not necessarily singling out Catholicism for criticism; it’s just that it’s the local faith and, therefore, influences everyone in the community.

Ritchie and Ivory never lose sight, however, that their film is a comedy, and they take pains to earn the amusing yet touching finale. In a fine ensemble cast, Hart stands out. His Kieran is homely, boorish and abrasive, yet his laughable pretensions to sophistication reveal an intelligent yearning for connection with the larger world and a determined unwillingness to accept the status quo.

While “The Closer You Get” may not become the box-office phenomenon that “The Fully Monty” was--few foreign films do--Pasolini and Fox Searchlight look to have another hit on their hands.

* MPAA rating: PG-13, for brief language and some sexual material. Times guidelines: The film has no sex scenes, but there are some racy double-entendres.

‘The Closer You Get’

Ian Hart: Kieran

Pat Short: Ollie

Cathleen Bradley: Siobhan

Niamh Cusack: Kate

Sean McGinley: Ian

A Fox Searchlight Pictures presentation of a Redwave production. Director Aileen Ritchie. Producer Uberto Pasolini. Screenplay by William Ivory; from a story by Herbie Wave. Cinematographer Robert Alazraki. Editor Sue Wyatt. Music Rachel Portman. Costumes Kathy Strachan. Production designer Tom McCullagh. Art director Shane Bunting. Running time: 1 hour, 32 minutes.

At selected theaters.