Intermission (John Crowley, 2003)

Urban love story about people adrift and their convoluted journeys in the search for some kind of love.

When the desperately insecure and emotionally inarticulate John breaks up with Deirdre to 'give her a little test' his plan backfires leaving her broken-hearted and him alone and miserable. Through chance and coincidence, their break-up triggers a roller coaster ride of interweaving escapades in the lives of everyone around them.

Intermission presents a slice of life, the passage between breaking up and making up, exploring how our lives intersect, and the power we all possess to affect the lives of those around us.

This is a fascinating film that ingeniously weaves together a myriad of overlapping stories whose common thread is life among the Irish working class. The screenplay focuses on a group of seemingly unrelated people whose lives crisscross and intersect in so well crafted a way that, as the story develops, a fully connected narrative soon emerges. The film is filled with humor and sentiment and just enough action and violence to keep the whole thing contemporary and cutting edge.