The Second Death (2000)

Director: John Michael McDonagh

Cast: Liam Cunningham, Michelle Fairley, Aidan Gillen

Synopsis: On a lonely country road, James Mangan hears a voice from his past and comes to realise he is damned.

Liam Cunningham (The Wind That Shakes the Barley, Centurion) and David Wilmot (’71), both of whom appear in director John Michael McDonagh’s The Guard, appear in this cryptic little 11-minute short. Cunningham plays a sombre man haunted by ghosts whose presence in his home ultimately brings about his demise. It’s short on plot and heavy on atmosphere, but it’s a little impenetrable to be honest. Cunningham, who has one of those faces that seem vaguely familiar but elusively difficult to attach to anything you’ve seen, gives a decent performance, and there are some interesting minor characters, one of which is a local police officer who might well be a blueprint for The Guard’s Gerry Boyle.

(Reviewed 20th February 2012)