Once (2006) is the story of a broken hearted busker in Dublin who works part time in vacuum cleaner shop, it's a modern day musical, built around some quite listenable singer/songwriter tunes.

Things start to brighten up when the busker meets a Czech girl selling the big issue, who (surprise, surprise) turns out to be a classically trained musician. He asks her to record an album with him and a rag tag group of street musicians. It all sounds sickeningly romantic but due to the stark visual style (no blue skies or soft focus in this film) and unsentimental writing manages to avoid entering the realms of 'cheese'.

What I found most satisfying about the film was that Once is the kind of story that Hollywood refuses to produce. I was expecting the traditional 'happy ending' and was surprised that this films didn't follow Hollywood conventions. The characters were only together for a week and had much longer and more complicated histories that stopped them from being together. This a film with it's feet firmly on the ground it's certainly worth a watch.