What is this movie about? About a simple man who loves his donkey and his sister? A man who strives to be kind and then becomes mean when his donkey dies and his sister leaves? Is it a story about a sophisticated man who strives for immortality and in the process forgets the Golden Rule? Is the simple man that simple? Is the sophisticated man truly sophisticated? Colum is a composer and musician, he listens to music on his phonograph, his simple house is furnished with objets d’art, such as African masks that dangle from the ceiling, out of place on a verdant Irish island. He knows who Mozart and Beethoven are and he emulates them. That’s much more than what Padriac brings to the table.

Padraic appears simple and his sister, when he asks her, reassures him that he isn’t but people mistake his kindness for stupidity. Certainly, I did. It is a common mistake. Padraic finds that the crueler he becomes the more respect he receives. He experiments with cruelty, sending one of Colum’s students away after telling him his father has been hit by a bread truck. It is a baseless lie but it accomplishes his goal: the student disappears clearing the way for Padriac to rekindle his friendship with Colum.  The lie is a means to an end.

Colum has no talent, since his music does resemble the wailing of banshees (not that I have ever heard a banshee wail, although I have seen Suzie and the Banshees perform live) but most people cannot distinguish between talent and empty noises; witness most pop and rock music of the 20th and 21st century. The priest asks during both confession scenes if he is keeping the despair at bay or is Colum expressing his despair in music that lacks melody or beauty? The priest intimates that Colum is responsible for his despair but Colum makes clear he is not interested in managing his despair but prefers to wallow in it. He cannot even remember nor recount his many sins, such as self-mutilation, much less acknowledge or address his despair verging on nihilism.

What is the significance of the self-mutilation? The priest declares it is a sin. Why is it a sin and what does Colum’s perverse decision to snip off all five of his digits reveal to us about his personality? Why would he swear to harm himself and not his old friend, Padraic, whom he has exiled socially on a small island, on which there is no escape nor alternative to the local pub where both are regulars? Surely, threatening to kill Padriac or his sister would have been more to the point and effective? In self-interest, Padriac could have left Colum alone, but Colum does not threaten to harm Padriac nor Siobhan. He threatens to harm himself, in an act of manipulation that Padraic cannot imagine; self-harm is not in his repertory because he is not psychologically sophisticated enough nor cruel enough to intentionally hurt himself or others. In fact, many tell Colum he has gone “mental.” It is only when Padriac’s beloved donkey Jenny dies as a result of Colum’s self-mutilation does Pardiac snap and come around to recognizing the hatred that has been kindled in his heart. But this hatred is not turned inward but outward towards the object of his suffering.

It is when Padriac experiences the rejection of his apology, the rejection of his attempt to reset the friendship and put the escalation aside, and the unintended death of his beloved donkey, along with the departure of his sister Siobhan, that he is able to tell Colum what his plan is and he says it loud enough for the entire village to hear, including the policeman: He will burn Colum’s house down, preferably with him in it Sunday afternoon at two.

What is the difference between mean and cruel in the movie? Padriac is mean when he tells the lie to the music student but he is not cruel. His act of meanness accomplishes a goal. Cruelty, in contrast, is the desire to inflict lingering pain that haunts the recipient either mentally or physically. You can understand why someone is mean, see their motives, perhaps have empathy for that person but cruelty is motivated by malice and the end goal is to inflict pain that lingers; pain is both the means and the end of cruelty and it does not need to justify itself.

Padriac is good for his word and at two o’clock on Sunday afternoon the house is ablaze with Colum in it. But this is not an eye-for-an-eye, tooth-for-a-tooth revenge, as he does not harm Colum’s dog in an act of revenge for the death of Jenny the adorable and beloved donkey. Rather, Padriac declares war against Colum, to the death. Like the soldiers on the mainland fighting between themselves, the war will drag on with no end in sight except for more bloodshed. Whatever triggered the fight no longer matters; we are now in a state of war, the catalysts and antecedents long forgotten in the fog of vengeance. The Irish have entered a cycle of violence between the Protestants and the Catholics; Padriac and Colum have also entered into a cycle of violence that I am sure will leave one of them dead and my guess is, it’s not Padriac.  

Colum’s desire for immortality, for student worship, for his superiority to be confirmed at the expense of Padriac’s friendship is the basis of his despair and the nihilism that will swallow him whole. Padriac will live with the hope that this sister will return and hope is the very thing that Colum lacks, along with his fingers. Because why would a composer and fiddler chop off his fingers? Vincent Van Gogh might have cut off his ear but it didn’t stop him from painting. Colum chops his fingers off to spite himself and his aspirations as an artist.  Why is he spiteful? Because he knows when he dies, no one will attend his funeral, no one will dig a grave for him and place a marker. No one will remember his compositions. In short, he is lower than a simple ass who was loved.

Ultimately, it is Padriac who earns our respect and our derision is left for Colum, who stands alone on the shore, back to his burnt-out house, no fingers on his right hand, coat singed from the flames, facing an infinite ocean with the whisperer of death to his right. She has prophesied that two people will die this weekend, inseminating an embryo of fear that it will be Siobhan and Padriac but justice on the island is more complicated.