Paper Plane (2026)
There was, by all accounts, a ripple of delighted applause in the room when the words "directed by Saoirse Ronan" appeared on screen, and I understand it completely, she is one of the finest actors of her generation and the goodwill towards her is enormous. I only wish Paper Plane, her directorial debut, had given me more to hold onto, because for all its evident sincerity I found it a frustratingly inert watch. A disappointed two and a half stars, said with real affection for the film-maker.
The premise is a quietly promising one. A defiant young girl stages a silent protest, refusing to return home until the disruptive presence of her father is gone, and her mother is left to decide whether to follow her into that defiance or let her go. Ronan has spoken of the film as a love letter to her younger self and to her mother, and you can feel that tenderness in it, an autobiographical ache about childhood, family tension and the things that go unspoken in a home.
And unspoken is the operative word, because this is a film that stakes almost everything on restraint. The dialogue is extremely sparse, and the meaning of nearly every scene is meant to live in the silences, the glances, the spaces between people rather than in anything anyone says. It is a legitimate and often beautiful approach, and I have no doubt some viewers will find it eloquent and affecting. For me, though, it tipped over from understatement into a sort of stillness where I kept waiting for something, a shift, a release, a moment of real connection, that never quite arrived. I came away feeling that very little had actually happened, or rather that whatever happened had been withheld from me so completely I could not reach it.
There is craft here, undeniably. It is shot on 35mm with a real eye, the performances are committed, young Martha Malone and Clare Dunne as the mother do sensitive work, and you can see the makings of a director with a genuine sensibility. I would not bet against Ronan making something lovely at feature length. But a short has so little time to earn its silences, and this one asked me to feel a great deal while giving me very little to feel it with.
Two and a half stars. Paper Plane is a sincere, handsomely made and deeply personal debut that simply did not connect with me, too withholding, too becalmed, too reliant on a resonance I never managed to catch. Admirers of hushed, elliptical cinema may well get far more from it than I did, and I would genuinely love to be won over by whatever Ronan directs next. This one, sadly, drifted past me.
Related on Movies With Macca
More from Country Ireland: I Swear (2025), Song of the Sea (2014), Jaha's Promise (2017)
More from the 2020s: All That's Left of You (2025), The Whale (2022), Look Back (2024)
More drama: I Will Be Alright (2026), Delisted (2026), Lady (2026)
