Is it just me or have you too noticed the arrival of “An Cailín Ciúin” in some TV advertisements? Two that stand out are for banks. In one, for Allied Irish Banks, a young father is sitting in a car. He’s house hunting, his young daughter in the back with rain lashing outside.
On the phone, he explains “it’s mad” and how it’s his 12th or 13th viewing. He turns to his little girl and says “will we try again? Come on” and they head to another viewing as a voiceover tells us how easy AIB makes it for first-time buyers.
Then he’s back in the car with his daughter sitting silent. “Well, what did ya think?” he asks. She says nothing, small and enigmatic as Mona Lisa in the Louvre. It ends with her staring out the car window while a voiceover assures us of all that’s good about AIB. Of course.
Then there’s the one for Bank of Ireland, with a rugby father and his teenage daughter sitting in the passenger seat of what appears to be a Range Rover. He is trying to convince her to keep up rugby training.
She rolls her eyes as he gets a phone-call. He learns how injury on the Ireland international rugby team means that, due to substitutions down the line, he has to come out of retirement to play for the local club (it’s an advertisement!). She remains quiet throughout, with more hints of Mona Lisa.
What’s with this “Quiet Girl” stuff? Have our advertisers been seduced by the (deserved) success of the multi-award winning An Cailín Ciúin, nominated for an Oscar in 2023 and in which said cailín was played by then 11-year-old Catherine Clinch. It seems so.
[ An Cailín Ciúin review: Delicately beautiful Irish film lives up to its billingOpens in new window ]
But, in real life, “quiet” and “girl” do not usually go together. Not quite like (allegedly!) love and marriage or horse and carriage.
However, a favourite TV advertisement has to be the father and son one for the phone network Three. The son tries to get his gruff, incommunicative farmer father to tell him how he is. Eventually, he gets a reluctant “ah sure, you know yourself” response. Perfect. Lovely nuanced performances, by superb actors I’ve been unable to identify, in a beautifully filmed and well-edited piece. All in 30 seconds. Quality.
Quiet, from Latin quies for rest, repose, tranquility.
inaword@irishtimes.com
