The gentle waves in Dollymount Strand reveal a man is seen floating atop the water, powerless and accepting of the tide. This is the opening of Dermot Malone’s new feature King Frankie. Peter Coonan plays former tech entrepreneur turned humble taxi driver Frankie as he prepares for the funeral of his father (Owen Roe) while having to deal with the sins of his past. The sins in question are told via frenetic flashback. Frankie deals with his own lust for wealth in the post Celtic Tiger world of 2009. Bolstering around his eight-year-old daughters over the top manor house birthday party as all his relationships reach a breaking point.  

King Frankie an odd revelation in Irelands modern cinematic landscape. Our collective artistic conscience seems to be going through a metamorphosis in that the chances we’re taking are getting riskier. Horror has been the genre of choice for this where it seems the real creativity has been taking place for years now. Films like The Hole in the Ground, I Am Not Your Mother and Double Blind and Oddity have shown to varying degrees that we can be just as an innovative and competent as our counterparts in the US and Europe. That being said there are issues prevalent in all the films mentioned, none of them are perfect but we are getting better and rewarding with our talent in the process.  

Drama has been kind of reeling behind in the last few years even if we got some genuine crackers in there. For every An Cailín Cúin or Herself there an equal amount of complete slop. King Frankie is an addition to the former though. Coonan is one of our finest talents and hasn’t had many meaty lead roles in the past decade or so since Love/ Hate (apart from the odd Irish language film which have been mostly slept on). Here he gives a career best in my view. The balancing act of the muted, emotionally aged, gentle cab driver versus his bravado laden yuppie wannabe constantly on the brink of disaster is such a joy to watch. The internal continuity he keeps in the film shows real skill along with the supporting cast who flesh out the world of the characters for its betterment.  

The filmmaking on show is also to be applauded. Malone’s own balancing act between the two timeframes of the film shows a bona-fide talent in the making. He finds a good sweet spot to each visual element of the film and creates something wholly cohesive in the process. The shaky cam visuals giving way to more dramatic camera positions with slow-mo were paced really well. The colour palette of modern Frankie being more desaturated than his decade younger counter-part is simple but difficult to be unique. The soundtrack is well placed too with motif of “The Irish Rover” being a nice touch.  

Honestly the few issues I have in the film is in the writing. I think there are a couple overused or cliched archetypes that the film could’ve fleshed out more both in certain characters (the yuppie socialites portrayed feel like something from an SNL skit) and in within the story (Frankie throwing out his prized comeback project directly into an open-faced bin feels like parody of that type of scene). The ending of the film is dragged out too where the show, don’t tell nature of the film ceases for an overly talky scene between two characters that just wasn’t needed in its current form.  

King Frankie is a great example of the change Irish cinema is having. A film that succeeds in being artistic without sacrificing its integrity for aesthetic or overblown pretentiousness. It’s not perfect, but it is a great watch that’s got great talent both in front and behind the camera.  

Rating 4/5

  • Directed by: Dermot Malone
  • Written by: Dermot Malone
  • Starring: Peter Coonan, Olivia Caffrey, and Ruairi O’Connor
  • Runtime: 1hr 35min
  • Released:  Oct. 11th, 2024 (IE)
  • Budget: €1,000,000 (est.)

Review by Marcus Rochford.

King Frankie Trailer