2008 | 84 min | Super 35

Cast & Credits

Director: Declan Recks

Principal Cast: Aidan Kelly, Eileen Walsh,Padraic Delaney, Enda Oates, Lesley Conroy, Karl Shiels

Screenwriter: Eugene O'Brien

Producer: David Collins

Editor: Gareth Young

Production Designer: John Hand

Director of Photography: Owen McPolin

Program Notes David Kwok, Tribeca Film Festival 2008

Director Declan Recks' adaptation of Eugene O'Brien's play renders a delicate dissection of a marriage in peril. In a small provincial town, Billy and Breda are approaching their 10th wedding anniversary. With two young children, their married life has disintegrated into a stale monotony, and the distance between them seems to grow by the day. He spends his time with the lads at the local pub, leaving Breda home watching television with the children. Billy clings to booze, his past glory (he was branded a local hero when he rescued a child from drowning in a river), and sexual fantasies about a younger woman. Breda, rather, holds onto an inkling of optimism for the future, believing the big anniversary will be the perfect chance to fix their dire situation. But as the date approaches, the reality of Billy and Breda's different needs and desires is slowly uncovered-to each other and to themselves.

Recks and O'Brien masterfully maneuver the emotional complexities of their characters, parlaying the utmost minutiae into brilliant indications of depth, and giving equal footing to both their beautiful and devastating sides. Recks' skilled eye frames every scene with a grand scope but ably captures every detail, and O'Brien naturally transfers his material from stage to screen, keeping all its muted intricacies intact. Actors Aidan Kelly and Eileen Walsh effortlessly breathe life into their characters with their nuanced performances. Eden, like marriage itself, reveals how sometimes the little things matter most.