Cowboys & Angels

Although there is a gay lead in first-time director David Gleeson's "Cowboys and Angels", this is by no means a gay film, rather a touching and heartwarming story of two young men coming-of-age in the heart of Dublin. Rivaling anything that's on the market today in the way of teen films, this rises above any of them with great performances and a fresh look at some old themes. It might be too sweet at times and neatly wrapped but the Irish charm of the characters keeps it afloat throughout.

Michael Legge plays Shane Butler, a geeky 20 year old lad from the suburbs who has just moved to Dublin. While searching for a flat to rent he stumbles upon a fellow classmate from high school, Vincent (Allen Leech), and the two reconnect when they both happen to be looking at the same apartment to rent. They decide to share it and Shane's adventure in the big city begins.

Shane is straight, has a quiet demeanor, and looks like his mom dressed him, while Vincent is more outgoing, dresses and looks funky, oh, and is gay. The two don't quite hit it off at first, but their friendship develops over time and Vincent takes him under his wing, as a friend and partly as a fashion project. Shane falls for a girl named Gemma (Amy Shiels) who works in a nearby burger joint, and it just so happens an old classmate of Vincent's. Shane has a hard time making the connection with her and is envious of her and Vincent's friendship. To make matters worse, Shane finds some drugs in the buildings lobby, he gets caught by the dealer (David Murray), and is then offered a large sum of money to make a run. He takes the offer hoping the money can either buy him a new wardrobe or help put him into art school and get him out of his dead-end job at the civil service department. A subplot involves a coworker named Jerry that is truly touching. In any event, Shane falls into the wrong crowd and friendships are tested, hearts broken, and loved ones lost. But in the end, true friendship endures and you can't help be touched by either one, the cowboy or angel.

It's a low-budget film with little in the way of a storyline and includes some diversions that have little bearing on the overall product. All of this would lead you to dismiss it as a lightweight offering. However, one of the main functions of a movie is to capture a sense of time and place and, in this context, Cowboys & Angels succeeds brilliantly. Even though it was made just two years ago, it has already found a unique position in time that viewers can relate to. It is set in my hometown of Limerick at the turn of the millennium as Ireland was moving from being the poorest country in western Europe to one of the wealthiest. Much of this happened to the bemusement of a population which had grown up on unemployment and emigration and now suddenly found itself surrounded by opportunities it had only dreamed of up to then. And along the way, a certain innocence was lost as a bulging generation of baby-boomers (Ireland's birthrate peaked thirty years later than its neighbours)worked its way through the buzz and the heartaches of transformation. In some ways, it resembles growing-up classics like American Graffiti and Rebel Without a Cause but set in a very different time and place. The main character, superbly played by Michael Legge, captures that wide-eyed innocence that the country was going through at the time while the photography picks up the youthful vitality of the city. While, on the surface, it may be an unremarkable tale about an unremarkable place, the ambiance is absolutely spot-on. Cowboys & Angels is perhaps the most representative contemporary feature film to come out of Ireland during the past decade.

Two Irish lads move in together. Vincent is a well-balanced gay art student and Shane is a sheltered and shy civil servant. Through a makeover a la "Queer Eye," Vincent helps Shane gain self-confidence. Unfortunately, Shane falls into the wrong crowd and starts trafficking drugs.

Is this a makeover movie (complete with themes about being true to yourself) or a movie about the Irish drug scene? It tries to be both, but it never finds a good balance. It ultimately strives to be about the relationship between the two young men, but it never really succeeds because the relationship is never fully developed for the viewer. This problem could have been easily avoided--two very endearing deleted scenes should have been kept in the film for sure. There are some random scenes that seem to come out of nowhere, but it all pieces together nicely (perhaps too nicely) in the end. The lead character does some awful things, like being part of a hit and run where a woman is terribly injured and a man is severely beaten when trying to call the cops, but in the end it is all okay because he's a likable guy with a fabulous gay roommate who has unexpectedly got the hook-up. Oh, please. Still, the overall theme of being yourself and true to yourself is great, even if the movie goes about expressing it in a half-assed way. And both lead actors are irresistibly cute.

This breezy comedy-drama marks an assured feature film debut for David Gleeson, who traces his interest in film back to his childhood in the Co. Limerick village of Cappamore, where his father ran the local cinema. Set in present-day Limerick City, his film stars Michael Legge, who played the teenaged Frank McCourt in Angela's Ashes, but it offers a very different view of the city to the rain-sodden misery of McCourt's early life - and to its Stab City image as the alternative murder capital of Ireland.

The emphasis of this warm, engaging movie is on the friendship that develops between two young men who agree to share an apartment for economic reasons. Shane (Legge) is a shy with girls and already bored with his job as a civil servant, and Vincent (Allan Leech) is a flamboyantly dressed, openly gay fashion design student. Shane's journey of self-discovery is charted with wit and insight in Gleeson's sweet-natured movie, which neatly resolves the potentially awkward moral dilemmas it raises. There is an appealingly natural chemistry between the charming lead actors, and a touching portrayal of a disillusioned older civil servant by Frank Kelly.

Flat-mate wanted: apply within. So begins the sweetest straight-gay friendship in recent memory. Shane is a lost and lonely 20 year-old civil servant from the suburbs; he's adorably hetero and has no sense of style. His new roommate in the big city is Vincent, a hot young fashion student, queer, innately stylish, full of life, surrounded by friends, and able to pick up a hot daddy in ten seconds. For Shane, Vincent unlocks buried artistic dreams and a burning need to embrace the adventure of youth. For Vincent, Shane is...well...he's a makeover project, inside and out. And soon enough, he's in serious trouble. Filled with just enough confidence to make just the wrong move, Shane falls in with two drug-dealing thugs downstairs, and things get dangerous fast. As he spins out of control, Vincent flinches from the monster he's created. But the flat has thin walls, and even at their worst, Shane and Vincent never stop listening for each other. Refreshingly, writer/director David Gleeson's vision of this friendship transcends all that we've come to expect from a gay-straight relationship onscreen. The warmth and youthful optimism that emerge from this duo is positively infectious, and Michael Legge and Allen Leech effortlessly bring to life one of the rarest kinds of love. Gleeson's production is polished and lyrical; like Shane's clothing designs, Cowboys and Angels is colorful, bold and exhilaratingly alive.