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Clear out junk files and repair common Windows errorsFree Scan →Fix the driver behind crashes, sound loss and screen glitchesFind Drivers →Small Things Like These makes its moral argument through what Bill Furlong cannot quite say. Cillian Murphy’s guarded performance, the film’s measured silences and a series of small encounters let the audience feel his growing recognition without spelling it out. That restraint makes the film a compelling example of “show, don’t tell” storytelling—not a provable best, but a particularly clear one.
What is Small Things Like These about?
Directed by Tim Mielants and adapted by Enda Walsh from Claire Keegan’s novella, the 2024 film follows Bill Furlong, a coal merchant and father in County Wexford. Around Christmas in 1980s Ireland, Bill encounters the town’s quiet complicity in the mistreatment of women and girls at a local convent. The story is less a procedural investigation of the institution than a portrait of Bill’s accumulated experiences and awakening, as Sight and Sound’s interview with Murphy and Walsh explains.
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![Small Things Like These [Blu-ray]](https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/51KDqzYEl3L._SL160_.jpg)
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Small Things Like These [Blu-ray] | $18.94 | Buy on Amazon |
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The Birds | Buy on Amazon | |
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The film engages with the history of Magdalene laundries and abuse in institutional settings, but its characters and plot are fictional. The Booker Prizes reading guide notes that the last laundry in Ireland closed on 25 October 1996 and that the Irish government issued an apology in 2013. Those dates provide historical context; they should not be mistaken for events in Bill’s story.
How does the film show what Bill is feeling?
Murphy’s face becomes the explanation
Bill is a man who registers more than he volunteers. In a pivotal delivery at the convent, a girl is forced through its doors while the camera stays on Murphy’s soot-faced expression. Shame, recognition and alarm register in that look, without a speech telling viewers exactly what to think. The BFI interview identifies the scene as an example of the performance carrying information that dialogue might otherwise explain.
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Silence leaves room for the viewer
The film does not treat every pause as a puzzle to solve. Walsh described the adaptation’s restraint this way: “the less we gave, the more space there was for an audience to feel it.” The line captures the method: the audience is invited to read Bill’s reactions, connect what he has seen with what he remembers, and sit with the implications before the story moves on. Silence here does not mean an absence of meaning; it is where some of the meaning gathers.
Small incidents build toward a choice
Bill’s decision gains force because it grows out of a life rather than arriving as a sudden heroic pose. Encounters at the convent accumulate alongside memories and the habits of a community that has learned not to look too closely. The BFI review describes the story as turning on a small act of grace. The scale of that act matters: it is neither grandly announced nor detached from the everyday costs and responsibilities Bill carries.
Rank #2
How sound and image support the restraint
The muted gray-and-brown palette and sparse sound design reinforce the film’s inward focus. Church bells and geese punctuate a soundscape inclined toward quiet, according to the BFI interview. This is not a film without dialogue; rather, it avoids using constant music or explanatory speech to direct every response. Ordinary sounds and pauses make the town feel lived in while keeping attention on what Bill notices.
Does the quiet approach work for every viewer?
Not necessarily. A story that withholds explanation can feel slow or emotionally withheld, especially if you expect historical drama to make its case through confrontation and explicit exposition. The Guardian’s Peter Bradshaw called the film subdued but absorbing; viewers may find the same measured pace either affecting or frustrating. Its emotional impact depends in part on whether you are willing to infer from glances, repetitions and small changes in Bill’s behavior.
Rank #3
The film’s restraint also distinguishes it from more explicit screen treatments of Magdalene laundry history. The BFI guide identifies Peter Mullan’s The Magdalene Sisters and Stephen Frears’s Philomena as related films. Small Things Like These takes a narrower route: it holds close to one man’s moral recognition rather than building a broad, explanatory account of the institutions. That focus gives Murphy’s performance room, though it means viewers seeking a fuller historical overview should look beyond this drama.
How does the film compare with Claire Keegan’s novella?
The film adapts Keegan’s compact novella rather than simply illustrating its plot. The Booker Prizes guide lists the book at 116 pages; its brevity suits a story built around concentrated moments and what remains unsaid. On screen, Murphy’s face and the film’s pauses make Bill’s interiority visible in a different medium. Keegan has described the story as being about a man who was loved in his youth and “can’t resist offering the same type of love to somebody else”. The film’s central act gives that thought a physical, consequential form.
Rank #4
Content note and viewing details
The film’s quiet presentation does not make its subject matter easy viewing. The UK BBFC classification record says it depicts pregnant young women and girls abused at a convent, including being locked overnight in a freezing coal shed. It also includes a flashback in which a young boy discovers his mother’s dead body. The BBFC describes the material as handled in a restrained and sensitive manner.
The BBFC lists the UK cinema version at 98 minutes 25 seconds and the 2024 UK home-entertainment version at 98 minutes 31 seconds. Disney+ rounds the runtime to 1 hour 38 minutes and lists the film as PG-13 on its US title page. That listing does not establish availability in every country or guarantee that it will remain on the service, so check the title page in your territory.
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