KNEECAP

Can there be a better recommendation? KNEECAP had its world premiere at the Sundance Film Festival, where it took home the Audience Award! The film features Móglaí Bap, Mo Chara, and DJ Próvaí—real members of the Irish-language hip-hop group Kneecap, playing themselves. Although fictional, the story is, as the creators themselves say, largely based on true events. Set to a powerful hip-hop beat, the film tells an age-old truth: a nation without its language ceases to exist.

In a world where a national dialect dies out every two weeks, fate brings together JJ, a teacher from Belfast, and two lads without much of a future. Thus begins the fight for something that should be unquestionable—the right to rap in their native language.

The band becomes a key link in the fight for recognition of the status of the Irish language., It soon becomes clear that their worst enemy is themselves. Their anarchic lifestyle, filled with hedonism, casual sex and drugs, often throws them outside the law and causes problems. 

KNEECAP is a wild, no-holds-barred ride, but at its core, it’s also a tragicomic tale about our innate human need to fight for our identity—be it personal, political, or artistic. In a supporting role, you’ll see Michael Fassbender, who, as he admits, had to brush up on his native Irish for the film. This is a movie that, while telling the story of its characters’ battle for national identity, will also leave you feeling energised and full of that unmistakable feel-good factor as you leave the cinema.

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Dorota Reksińska