Musical without being a Musical, moving without being overly dramatic - in other words: fantastic!

Rating: 8/10 (6 January 2008)

I really didn't know what to expect when I started watching "Once". All that I had heard was that this was supposedly one of the best movies of the year. It starts out with a busker singing in the streets. A guy with a thick Irish accent appears and I thought, wow, I'm going to be lost. Thankfully, the main characters were speaking more comprehensibly as the movie progressed. The singing part remained, though. To my surprise that didn't bother me at all, but the songs actually turned out to be so beautiful and interwoven with the movie so naturally that they became the heart and soul of "Once".
Leading actors Glen Hansard (frontman of The Frames) and Markéta Irglová not only played their roles to perfection, they also wrote and performed the soundtrack, which should win them all sorts of prizes and get them worldwide recognition. Their performances are really quite an achievement.
The story itself is unagitated and realistic up until the very end, which is what makes it so moving. "Once" isn't a fairy tale, but a snap shot of a romance that breaks through all sorts of bleak circumstances and sheds some light on the hard lives of these lovely people. It's a movie that genuinely deserves to be called "romantic" unlike so much nonsense that's listed under "Romance" on IMDb. This one is the real deal. Get the handkerchiefs out and be sure to watch this with the one you love. It might be too sad otherwise.