Waking Ned

A comedy set in a small village on the Irish coast. Fifty-two people live there. Word comes that the big lottery prize has gone to someone in the district. Jackie and his friend Michael set out to find the winner. Their method is simple: they invite everyone to dinner and watch faces. They find him. The man is sitting at home with the ticket in his hand, gone the moment he heard; dead of the shock. From there the film becomes a plan. So the money is not lost, Michael will take his place and introduce himself as Ned when the lottery official arrives. But there is a problem: for the identity to hold, everyone in the village has to tell the same lie. What follows is the whole village cooperating. Everyone is persuaded, everyone wants a share, and all but one person agrees. What the narrative is interested in is not money but partnership: it tells a fraud and turns it into a story about a community. The landscape is part of the film. It was shot on the Isle of Man, and the coast, the hills and the narrow roads are constantly in frame. Ian Bannen plays Jackie and David Kelly plays Michael; the age and ease of the pair set the whole tone. Fionnula Flanagan is in the cast. Kirk Jones wrote and directed; it is his first feature. Who it is for: anyone who likes warm, small-scale British and Irish comedy. Who it is not for: anyone looking for sharp humour; the film is gentle, predictable and disturbs nobody.