Director: John Crowley
In Brooklyn, Saoirse Ronan gets one of her first opportunities to play a woman, or at least someone who arrives at womanhood by the end of the picture. Consistent with her earlier performances, she is incredibly gifted as a reactive performer–in Hanna, that skill was used to great effect in creating suspense, making the audience wonder when the weapon would strike next. Here, it would be easy to mistake her as a passive observer in her own life, pulled by the whims of others into directions she didn’t necessarily embark on herself. And yet she has a thoughtful sense of wariness, not to mention a penchant for utter protest. When the Italian American plumber who courts her (Emory Cohen) confesses his love for the first time, it is unclear what she will say in return, or even how she will approach him the next time they encounter. This is not because Ronan doesn’t clue us into a sense of the character’s interiority, rather she suggests the seismic shifts happening in a woman’s mind, marking the transition from a mere participant to someone who takes action.
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