Once (Upon a Time)

Why did the late, great Glen Hansard’s starring role in the movie Once so affect me? And, achingly, why has his death the other day on a dark, wet Dublin road so affected me, and clearly millions of others?

Let’s start with that glittering little gem of a movie, made on the cheap, but with a story so rich it fills the coffers of your soul with gold.

Was it because of the simple story of Once (I’m a small movie man, not one for epics)? Was it because of the songs, which are deep and rich? Was it because Glen was already well known to me from The Frames? Was it because of the Ireland where I am from? Was it because of the quiet brilliance of the performances?

Those were all great things. But here’s what it so affected me (Spoiler alert!):

The guy did not get the girl, but the girl did get the piano.

This movie flipped the romantic script. This movie demonstrated the truth and beautiful nature of self-sacrificial love. Glen’s character - the guy - despite having his own wishes dashed, pursuing a noble end for both himself, and his married love interest.

The scene-stealer is when she - the girl - wanders out her door to the sound of the removalist van that has left a piano on her doorstep (their doorstep, meaning husband and child and friends). It’s a salvific moment.

And the look of gentle satisfaction on “the boy’s” face as he signs off on his life in Dublin, to head off to a new life in England, with the knowledge of the joy he has imparted before he left.

This is the antithesis of the romantic comedy of its day (a genre itself that has taken a hit in these Tinder/Gen Z times).

This is a spiritually charged romantic gesture, a true expression of the higher love beyond one’s own self interests, one that comes at cost to oneself.

It is a deeply sacrificial act born out of love for the other person’s interests not merely one’s own. There is true pleasure in that moment, pleasure that lasts and is not fleeting. No guilt the next day.

That’s one of two scenes in Once that drives me to tears, the other being the quiet joy on his ostensibly conservative Dublin father’s face as he listens to the musical creation of his son on a tinny cassette player.

There his father sits in his two-up-two-down, in front of the airing cupboard and the gas meter box with the old tea pot on the table. And he pauses before the joy between them kicks in.

There’s a deep father-hunger there, and to see the deep bond between them as the father approves of the son, and says “Play it again!” Well, there’s redemption written all over this tiny, seemingly innocuous script.

In that small, deep moment we catch a glimpse of the deep desire of so many sons who have sought the approval of a father, a father who may be successful, worldly-wise, intelligent and well-groomed. Yet here is a retired, widowed, working class man who has nary left his bricked street. Yet such redemption! Such love! The love of the father!

Once is a “Once Upon a Time” fairy tale that upends the traditions, empowering it to reflect the “true myth” or as we might put it, the “true fairytale” of the gospel in which the lover pursues the blind and lost love interest for that person’s own good and not their own. It’s a Jesus moment for sure.

And the second reason I feel so affected by Hansard’s death is that because, from how the testimonies and shared stories are coming out, he was something of a reflection of that character himself.

I listen to a lot of his music, and there is a depth to it, and a mercy, that is unfamiliar to the music world of hyper sexuality and violence.

There is a pathos and beauty about his music and lyrics that were an extension of his evidenced love of the world and the people who inhabited it. There was a deep generosity to how he lived among others, brought others into his orbit, shared the glory around, and indeed shunned it for himself.

I feel the same way listening to Glen Hansard’s music that I do in reading, Paul Kingsnorth’s words (from England, but now living in the west of Ireland).

A friend and I spoke online about this yesterday after she sent me Bono’s tribute to Glen.

I wrote:

“I feel terribly sad about this one because of his otherworldly nature.”

She replied:

“Some hit different, hey? He seemed to operate on a different plane.”

My again:

“He was almost a wide eyed innocent for his whole life, not just his childhood.”

I am unaware of the sins and foibles of Glen known only to those who knew him most, but there was something about Glen Hansard that made Once feel almost like a documentary (and in many ways it mirrored his life). Something about his death that broke a little bit of a lot of people.

It doesn’t feel like a fairytale ending, and 56 is too young, especially with a wife and young child.

Perhaps it’s an Irish thing, there can be no joy without pathos. God will one day wipe away every tear, but in the meantime we sit in the incomplete fairytale.