13/11/2025 - With staggering simplicity and suspense expertly peppered with paranoia, Eamonn Murphy examines the unspoken anxieties of a widowed farmer living in isolation

"Stressed?” – “Sometimes” – “Sleep?” – “Not much”. Old age, with its successive deaths of loved ones, inevitable distance from younger generations who are living their own lives, slowing down of all things physical, and shrinking of social circles, is far from a bed of roses, and the sense of our own vulnerability can chip away at the most impenetrable mental armour. But it can take on even greater disturbing dimensions when threats are lurking. This is the focus of Solitary, Eamonn Murphy’s first feature which was set in the remote rural province of Leinster and which was crowned Best Independent Irish Film in Galway before being screened in an international premiere in competition at the 26th Arras Film Festival.

"We don’t need to talk, you know. We can just sit in silence if you like". Brendan (Gerry Herbert) is a man of very few words. A widower for five years, the farmer is trapped in a daily routine ranging from managing dairy cows to taking little grocery trips into town, Sunday mass, a quick visit to the deserted local pub, or helping out his old friend, Peg (Frances Blackburn). But he doesn’t complain, keeping his all-consuming grief to himself and stoically accepting his solitude, involving meals eaten alone, a kitchen radio, his dog Boots and the endless tick-tocking of the clock. Despite the attentions of his loving daughter, Siobhán (Cate Russell), who wants to move to Dublin and who suggests in vain that her father come to live with her, of Shane (Cailum Carragher), who soon comes to help him out on the farm during the working week, and of police officer William (Emmet Kelly) who looks out for him from afar, Brendan is unspeakably lonely.

And it’s no better at night because there isn’t a soul living anywhere near his home in the county of Laois nestled in the heart of the Midlands, and the slightest noise (the revving of an engine, footsteps, a stranger asking for a spare tyre who Brendan doesn’t open the door to, etc.) wakes him up and leaves him nervous and on edge. His hypervigilant state only worsens when his house is burgled while he’s out, and things escalate even further when he witnesses a violent attack in the pub (which ends in the death of his old friend, the barman) carried out by three thieves who disappear while threatening him with possible reprisals ("I know your face"). Little by little, Brendan barricades himself indoors, getting into the habit of wandering around the house at night-time with a hammer in his hand …

Shot by way of static shots focusing on facial expressions (a special mention goes to the lead actor whose stoney-faced charisma fills the screen to perfection) and the agitated nature of the movie’s dialogue, Solitary is an incredibly simple, realist and moving film about the scars that come with the passing of time, the understandable but perilous fixation on autonomy at all costs, and the struggle to acknowledge our inner malaise or to communicate it to loved ones. It’s infused with the tragic perfume of a life nearing its end and an extremely empty day-to-day existence, whose subtlest nuances the director explores whilst also endowing the story with a whisper of tension, skilfully incorporating genre film elements (delinquency and a police investigation, an oppressive nocturnal atmosphere sometimes veering into horror), which are further enhanced by Jonathan Casey’s score. Overall, it turns this self-produced film made with very limited resources into a wonderful example of film art which is capable of expressing so much with so little.

Solitary was produced by Prophecy.

(Translated from French)