Get Up and Go

Filmed in Dublin, Get up and Go is a low budget affair boasting two of Love/Hate's leading lights in the main roles. Peter Coonan (Alex) and Killian Scott (Coilin) are twenty-something housemates who although seemingly friends for years are two polar opposites. Alex is a wannabe musician who is brash, impulsive and selfish. Coilin is an introverted and awkward romantic type who incongruously is trying to catch a break as a Comedian.

The down-at-heel, impoverished nature of their lives is laid out early on. A depressed looking Coilin waking up in a grimy Dublin flat, goes to the Kitchen to make himself some tea in a pint glass while covered head to toe in his duvet. Meanwhile Alex lies in bed next to his girlfriend over at her place. She announces she is pregnant; he tells her he does not want to be a Daddy at this time but instead wants to proceed with a shared dream he and her had to move to London- with or without her (but definitely not including baby).

Alex's burning need to leave for London that very same day is the narrative device employed here as Coilin, while also declining the offer of going to London with Alex drives him around downtown Dublin as they chase some debts owed and otherwise attempt to borrow the moolah required to meet the fare. Cue many, mostly unfunny encounters with former colleagues, disgruntled employers, detached friends and assorted acquaintances as they go from one place to another.

Unfortunately Get up and Go while striving to be funny doesn't raise enough laughter to be successful in that endeavour. Sure enough, Alex likes to joke around but because he is essentially unlikeable the most I could muster was the occasional titter. On the other hand lovelorn Coilin is played for pathos but because he comes across as plain weird I didn't feel much of an emotional connection with him either. In Coilin's case I think his character may have come to life more with a better back story. As for Alex, right to the end there isn't anything redeemable enough about him that makes me want to root for him.

The most enjoyable part of the movie is in recognising so many of the locations in and around the city of Dublin. It also features music from the likes of Adrian Crowley and Villagers.

Get up and Go is a day in the life film which follows best friends Alex and Coilin as they meander their way around Dublin City, mingling with their wider circle of friends in trendy cafés and gloomy bars, struggling with the everyman issues such as unrequited love, job loss, job hunting and, in Alex's Case, the rush to make the evening ferry to England so as to escape your recently impregnated girlfriend and a doomed life of pram pushing.

Alex and Coilin, we get the impression, have been friends for a long time and Get up to Go lands in the realms of films such as Adam & Paul and Withnail & I in regards to the wandering brothers in arms, the friendship at its core being a marriage of convenience more so than a common camaraderie or joy in each other's company.

Peter Coogan plays Alex, a recently laid off cinema employee who's mission for the day in question is to procure enough cash to get the ferry (not a plane, strangely enough) to London. Killian Scott plays timid comedian Coilin who we suspect is some way off his big break. He is aiming to firstly get a gig and then woo his soul mate Lola, played by Gemma-Leah Devereux, who couldn't be less interested as she has all her own chaos lined up for the day.

The opening twenty minutes of the film are slow as the two protagonists ponder their plans driving from one location to another. But the film unexpectedly begins to shift into gear as other characters enter the frame and we begin to observe a group of people who are friends by default, we suspect. Friends because they've been friends all their adult life and it's here that Get up and Go begins to reveal a heart and depth at its center even if portions of the film suffer from some Friends TV culture, characters sitting around in pubs and cafés all day, apparently coming and going from jobs as they please.

The film would have suffered further if it weren't for the anchoring performances of Killian Scott and Peter Coogan. Scott is lovably subtle as the awkward loveless loser Coilin and Coogan carries over the bravado and charisma of Love/Hate's Fran without that characters psychotic side. The script, although a story we've seen in Irish film many times before, moves forward with purpose and offers more than a few laughs and intriguing scenes such as when both protagonists are on the point of 'sealing the deal' as Alex describes it but choose not to for their own reasons. The third key character in the film is Dublin City and Vladimir Trivic's hand held camera captures Dublin like we know it from nights out in the city and calls to mind another Dublin set film, Once.

Get up and Go is an enjoyable film with a couple of laughs and recognisable if not likable characters along the way. Its flaws are its lack of originality and the fact that it's a little light weight in parts. However there is a heart at its core and its scrutiny of people in their mid to late twenties who are as unsure about life as they probably were in their mid to late teens is one that's worth your while.