My Brothers

Directed by Paul Fraser. Starring Timothy Creed, Paul Courtney, TJ Griffin, Don Wycherley, Kate Ashfield, Terry McMahon 15A cert, general release, 88 min

YOU COULD reasonably argue that Ireland is too small a country to host a road movie. After all, by the time the protagonists have got the car into third gear they’ll have reached their destination.

Paul Fraser and Will Collins work hard to dismantle that apparent misconception in this largely charming comedy set in a sad, worn-out version of the 1980s. Fraser, who directs Collins’s script, is best known for writing Shane Meadows’s films such as Dead Man’s Shoes and Somers Town.

Following three kids as they make their way to the archetypal tourist town of Ballybunion, My Brothers exhibits much of Meadows’s compassion for ordinary lives. But, though touching on mortality, the film is lighter and more comforting than the Staffordshire maestro’s work.

Set over a Halloween weekend in 1987, the story concerns itself with the trials of Noel (Timothy Creed), a sensitive teenager, and his brothers Paudie (Paul Courtney), a slow thinker, and young Scwally (TJ Griffin). Times are grim. The boys’ father, played in glimpses by Don Wycherley, is slowly dying and money doesn’t seem to be in great supply.

When bullies break his dad’s watch – a cheap item with great sentimental value – Noel decides to embark on a small odyssey to secure a replacement. The timepiece came from a claw-grab arcade game in Ballybunion, and Noel believes (slightly illogically, it must be said) that this is the only place redemption can be achieved. Paudie and Scwally tag along.

Despite the shortness of the journey, the characters manage to encounter an extraordinary degree of colourful incident. They evade an impressively vile roadside pederast. They get to watch a 3D movie. In

a rather beautiful moment of forgivable trickery, words are spelt out in the open air with sparklers.

This scattershot visual poetry does occasionally get out of hand (a dying whale?) but the three young actors do enough to lift the picture above the ordinary. Creed is touching. Griffin manages to be alternately annoying and adorable. But, as the awkward Paudie, Courtney proves to be a character actor of some brilliance. Let’s see more of him.