Irish actor Brendan Gleeson has said that he is tired of watching fatherhood being portrayed in such a negative way on screens.
Gleeson, best known for starring in The Banshees Of Inisherin, made these comments ahead of his upcoming project H Is For Hawk, which sees him star alongside The Crown star Claire Foy, who plays a Cambridge graduate who builds an unlikely repour with a stubborn hawk named Mabel, while coping with the grief of her father's death.
The movie sees Gleeson play Helen's father, Alisdair MacDonald, and speaking to the BFI London Film Festival, the actor emphasised the importance of celebrating fatherhood on the big screens.
"I think dads have got an awful hard time lately. And I don’t believe that every dad is toxic, and I don’t think anybody else does either", Gleeson said. "I think I suddenly got very tired of watching fatherhood portrayed as something that was almost an abuse, or that was toxic in some way, or in some way truncated by where you had these emotionally stunted people walking around that couldn’t hug their kids, whatever it was".
The movie is based on the memoir of same name by Helen MacDonald, and is based on her grieving for her father, which the Dublin actor says "so much more about what is really important about paternity, and what is really important about fatherhood, and why the beauty that is within of that, needs to be celebrated".
He continued: "I think young men need to see it. It needs to be reaffirmed".
"I really just want to celebrate paternity and how much and how deeply it affects things".
"I think this particular film is so beautiful in the way that that’s what it’s trying to do. The memory of this man is that he was a proper, good man who gave love to his daughter".
Elsewhere, Brendan Gleeson spoke about his own experiences of being a father. His two sons Domhnall and Brian are both actors.
"When I had my kids, I realised I no longer have the option to be pessimistic", Gleeson said. "I bought in to the life. So optimism now is a duty, not a choice".
Speaking of Brendan's children, his son Domhnall is currently starring in The Office spin off, The Paper. More on this here.
