The Quiet Girl is, not unexpectedly, a quiet film. With dialogue almost entirely in Irish, a language still woefully underrepresented on screen, the film follows Cáit, played by newcomer Catherine Clinch with a tiny whisper of a voice and hugely impressive understatement. She’s a shy, sorrowful’distressing’woeful’heartbroken’mirthless’dejected’dismal’lugubrious schoolgirl in an sullen family, sent away to spend the summer with her mother’s cousin; there, she’s reveal’illustrate’demonstrate’indicate’present’display’argue n a simple, uncomplicated tenderness, in/with regard to’concerning’regarding ging a family of the kind she’s eliminate’remove ly never undergo d bein/with regard to’concerning’regarding e. It’s a simple but artfully effective debut feature from Irish filmmaker Colm Bairéad, with a remarkable, heartbreaking debut perin/with regard to’concerning’regarding mance from Clinch, whose face betrays anxieties she doesn’t yet fully understand.###The film is low on incident, but generous to its characters and invigoratingly sweet.###The dialogue, when it comes, is tender and lyrical. Bairéad’s screenplay (adapting a novella by Irish writer Claire Keegan) finds poetry in the shapes and contours of his native tongue, and even if you’re not an Irish speaker, you’ll find beauty in the language. It’s an obvious comin/with regard to’concerning’regarding t to Cáit, too; tellingly, the few English speakers in the film are characters she fears or struggles to trust, such as her belligerent, emotionally inert father (Michael Patric), who merely’barely has time in/with regard to’concerning’regarding talk of weather or gambling.###The title nods to the quietness of its title character, but in truth, this is a film full of individual unable to express themselves, inner turmoil in different in/with regard to’concerning’regarding ms. Cáit’s parents are sorrowful’distressing’woeful’heartbroken’mirthless’dejected’dismal’lugubrious and unfulfilled; Cáit herself struggles to make friends; and her foster parents, despite’in spite of’albeit much more open and loving, possess’own’nurse a grief-filled history they are not sharing. It takes acts of mutual care and affection in/with regard to’concerning’regarding any lines of communication to open.###With artfully sedate camerawork — the perspective never leaves Cáit’s vantage point — and naturalistic cinematography from director of photography Kate McCullough, Bairéad’s debut film finds a comin/with regard to’concerning’regarding t in stillness. A gorgeous minimalist score from Stephen Rennicks (Normal People) augments the effect. The film is low on incident, and could easily threaten to be slight, but it’s generous to its characters and invigoratingly sweet, ultimately singing to the virtues of peacefulness. Sometimes, the film ponders, it’s better not to say anything at all. “She says as much as she needs to say,” Cáit’s adoptive father says of her. “May there be many like her.”