Festa Mobile/Europop screening - review - THE STAG by John Butler

John Butler takes blends The Hangover and City Slickers and creates a new gem of Irish cinema's comedy genre with The Stag.

There have been numerous attempts from Irish cinema to re-create the success of mainstream movies with more modest budgets. Some of them have worked, but in must be said that the vast majority of them have failed and usually fallen into inevitable oblivion. Then, along comes John Butler with his film The Stag backed by the Irish Film Board, a film that on paper may seem like the Irish version of The Hangover, but also ends up taking on the male bonding adventure genre of City Slickers and also comes across as a lot less childish and sometimes even more creative than both. 

The story is relatively simple. A man named Fionnan is getting married and his wife-to-be practically forces his best friend Davin to organise a stag for him to get him off his all too meticulous and borderline obsessive wedding planning antics. So, he plans a few days of camping with friends, a plan which Fionnan reluctantly agrees to. However, to make matters worse, she also insists that they take her brother along with them – a man whose outrageous antics and dangerously eccentric behaviour has people referring to him as ‘The Machine’.

This story explores, and in a way make fun of, the many different perspectives of masculinity - from the old school alpha-male to the effemminate homosexual. Nevertheless, Butler and co-screenwriter Peter McDonald remarkably never let this theme slip into tastelessness despite the many occasions that the film had to go too far. The Stag does not mean to offend and yet it still comes across as daring and fresh because of its ability of using the often disregarded art of restraint.

Deepening an emotional and psychological aspect to the story are interesting and even skilfully intricate situations. While these situations are resolved in a foreseeable manner, its predictability supplemented by an array of creative gags and intimate moments that span from immature to mature. For instance, there is a hilarious sequence in which ‘our heroes’ high on MDMA go for a night time run around naked in the woods in a fruitless search for a lake that results in them desperately trying to keep warm by mimicking the emperor penguin tactics. On the other hand, there is a very intense moment where they sing songs around a campfire and reveal sides of themselves that they always kept concealed for better or worse – out of these is a penetrating performance of On Raglan Road when Davin finally reveals in his own way his love for his best friend’s fiancé.

These moments add up to an exciting rollercoaster ride of laughs and warmth, friendship and quarrel that has rarely been so successfully balanced and rewarding. In fact, this film is simply better than the vast majority of films of the same kind – a statement often said but rarely truly meant that certainly rings true in Butler’s film.

And while the film lacks its star power, though this is a statement that concerns lazy marketing more than anything else as the cast is simply amazing, it plays up and even celebrates its ‘Irishness’ fearlessly – from numerous references of U2 to a ‘cheesy’ final speech preaching Irish unity in these times of financial struggles (that truth be told is nice to hear especially when viewing the film at an international film festival with an international audience).

Entertaining and overall rewarding, The Stag seems to be destined to become a true gem of Irish cinema’s comedy and there is just no reason why it shouldn’t be.