Life is a Breeze (2013)

This movie is a movie with a small scope.  There is a disturbance in the force, which drives the plot forward, but the movie is much more about the characters than the action that occurs on screen for an hour and a half.  The movie is about how this family is coping with the world at large.

Nan (the incomparable Fionna Flanagan) is a good old-fashioned Irish hoarder. The Dublin resident has never been much trouble to her neighbors and generally keeps to herself.  Despite her family's need of a matriarch, she is not fitting that bill.  They all circle around her, but she in no leader. Her unemployed son Colm (Pat Shortt) rally his other family members to give Nan a gift she could never give herself—a clean house. Niece Emma (Kelly Thornton) takes Nan out for the day, and they return to a spotless home. Old newspapers, broken kitchen appliances, endless piles of junk are all gone. So is the old mattress Nan has been sleeping on and shoving her money into because she doesn’t trust the banks. That’s right: there’s lots of money in a mattress now winding its way through the Dublin recycling system. A journey to find it ensues.

But as is so often the case, it is not the destination but the journey itself that is so telling.  In times of stress, everyone shows their true colors, and this movie is no exception.  While Nan doesn't come off as an inspirational family head, she is not one to blame and she is not one to give up.  Emma has been given the opportunity to rise above her family's pathology and she has a hope of following through.  It is an enjoyable movie, streaming now on Netflix.