Jump

Set entirely on New Year's Eve in Derry, we meet Greta (Nichola Burley) who is about to jump off a bridge when she is stopped by Pearse (Martin McCann), who, just minutes earlier, had been dangled off that same bridge by two heavies for asking too many questions about his missing brother. Greta's two friends - Marie (Charlene McKenna) and Dara (Valene Kane) - aren't aware of Greta's suicidal situation, and are out on the town having a good time, but run into their own set of complications. Then there's Johnny (Richard Dormer), a bad man looking for a fresh start and a clean break from his crooked boss Feeney (Lalor Roddy), who also happens to be Greta's father. Plus both of these men might happen to know something about Pearse's missing brother, and over the course of the night, all of these stories will twist and turn and collide with each other.

For anyone who has seen the 1999 flick Go, we're in some very familiar territory here. Writer/director Kieron J Walsh - whose last cinema release was When Brendan Met Trudy back in 2000, though he's probably better known for directing episodes of Raw and The Savage Eye - brings a lot of high energy to proceedings, and even if there isn't an original idea on display here, it's never less than interesting to watch. He also makes Derry look beautiful, and throws in a few interesting camera-moves, giving a professional gloss to the movie as a whole.

Burley is fine as the leading actress, but her character is a bit wishy-washy, and vaguely difficult to warm to. On the other hand, McCann continues his streak of great, charismatic performances, and is quietly building himself up as one of Ireland's fantastic young actors. The rest of the cast are mostly interchangeable, bar Roddy as the big bad guy, who almost chokes on the scenery he's chewing on.

The biggest issue is that it's never quite funny enough to be a comedy, never quite serious enough to be a drama, and never quite exciting enough to be a thriller. It just falls between the cracks of genre, muddling the story and how we're supposed to react to it. Had Walsh decided on one particular genre, we might've had a great Irish film on our hands here, as opposed to merely a good one.