Once

I'm on the one movie at a time plan with Netflix, so it's a rare day that I don't immediately eject the dvd from my player and mail it off straightaway. Except for this one. I cannot seem to seal up this envelope. I don't want this movie to leave me.

Once is an absolutely beautiful, quiet, tender little film about two people, who, under different circumstances, should have been together, and maybe would have been together. Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova play two musicians, one Irish, one Czeck, who meet by chance, spend a week writing and recording music, and then go their separate ways. It's one of those relationships that leaves a mark on your soul forever. The movie and the soundtrack have certainly left their marks on mine.

This movie won best original song at this year's Academy Awards show, for "Falling Slowly", which, when you listen to it below, you will totally understand why. It also won a Critic's Choice Award this year, and was nominated for a British Independent Film Award and scores of others. But, none of that would matter, as this is just a heartbreaking movie. Maybe I'm taking it a little too closely to heart, but I find myself thinking about this movie in quiet moments. And then I find myself wanting to get more music from the Frames, an independent Irish band that I really need to learn more about. Hansard is a brilliant songwriter. And his collaboration with Irglova seems to be dictated more by fate and the muses rather than random chance. I think these two may now be a couple in real life, but don't quote me.

What you should take my word for is the absolute necessity of seeing this movie, more than once, and listening to the soundtrack until it becomes part of you. It's just one of those pieces of work that really is "required". Trust me. You will not be the same.