‘Kneecap’ takes the Irish language revolution to the big screen

It’s a remarkably cool time to be Irish. Cillian Murphy has his Oscar, Paul Mescal wears his short shorts, and Sally Rooney’s forthcoming novel is one of the most anticipated of the year. 

It was only a matter of time before the Irish language earned the same reputation as its people. 

In Kneecap, the semi-fictionalized origin story of the Belfast Irish-language rap group of the same name, Irish is the language of rebellion … and consuming large quantities of ketamine, cocaine, acid, and MDMA. 

Often repeated in the film is the line, “Every word of Irish spoken is a bullet for Irish freedom.” The movie takes place in 2019 in West Belfast, during the height of advocacy for recognition of the Irish language in the United Kingdom. In 2022, the country’s Identity and Language Act passed, granting Irish an equal status to English. It established the Irish language commissioner to develop Irish in Northern Ireland, repealed the ban of Irish in Northern Ireland courts, and allowed members of the Northern Ireland Assembly to speak Irish. The reality of the band’s formation in 2017 was just as closely tied with the moment. 

In real life, Naoise Ó Cairealláin, who goes by Móglaí Bap, was out spray painting walls with the slogan “Cearta,” which means “rights” in Irish, the night before an Irish Language Act march. While Bap got away, the friend who was with him got picked up by the police, refused to speak English, and spent the night in jail awaiting a translator. 

The incident inspired Bap to recruit Mo Chara, real name Liam Óg Ó Hannaidh, to join him in writing and recording “C.E.A.R.T.A,” their first song. They filmed and put out a music video, but didn’t plan to do any more songs. After the song was denied play on the Irish language radio station due references to drugs and cursing, a petition circulated and the track went locally viral. “We had no plan to start a band, but that demand…” Bap said to Mashable. The group has since released two albums, all in Irish with a dash of English, and they still frequently go viral, for both tongue-in-cheek republican stunts — that often turn into self-referential songs of their own — and their solidarity with Palestine.

Kneecap puts the live music in living language

The group takes a necessary alternative approach to the legal and political work around the Irish language in the UK. Having begun their band five years before the 2022 law was passed, they’ve worked to create energy around the language, which continues to be “endangered,” according to some linguists.

“Having music is an important part of a living language, especially music that represents the language people speak on the streets and amongst each other socially,” said Bap. “It’s a very natural way to learn, especially with hip-hop, because hip-hop has story lines and a certain way of delivery. You’re going to learn a lot of the language through the music.”

The third member of the group, JJ Ó Dochartaigh / DJ Próvaí, a former Irish teacher, used to translate pop songs into Irish as a teaching tool. “Learning through music always sticks in your head more than just rote stuff,” Próvaí told Mashable. 

While Chara insists that they are also “just trying to make tunes,” their impact on interest in the Irish language is undeniable. When the British director of the film, Rich Peppiatt, enrolled in a night Irish class in Belfast in 2019 while doing research for the film, half the students in the class said they were there because of Kneecap. 

When interviewed about American interest in Ireland earlier this year, Eleanor O’Leary, a lecturer in media and communications at South East Technological University in Ireland, noted the new attention to the Irish language, pointing to Kneecap’s online following as an example of the new energy. 

Duolingo has also seen surges in interest in Irish. During the pandemic, Irish became the most popular language in Ireland for both new and existing users, overtaking Spanish. In 2021, Irish was the fastest growing language on Duolingo, with a million people actively learning it — quite high for a language which, according to Kneecap, only 80,000 people speak. From the end of 2022 to the end of 2023, Duolingo saw a 70 percent increase in daily active learners in the Irish course. 

Now, with the film, the group is poised to reach a more global audience.

Paying homage to rap’s legacy

Bap grew up speaking Irish at home, while Chara and Próvaí learned it through school. The boys are quick to cite their history, telling Mashable that Irish language primary schools didn’t exist in Northern Ireland until 1972, and Irish language secondary schools didn’t come into being until 1991. 

Kneecap’s members are, of course, big fans of hip-hop’s sound, but they were also attracted to the genre’s history of giving a voice to Black Americans and its central nature of storytelling. “Irish speakers in the North never really had a voice for a long time. We thought it was a great opportunity for us to let the world know about the North, about Ireland, that the Irish language does exist, it’s not just English with a funny accent,” said Bap.

Storytelling is intrinsic to Irish culture, and knowing that not many of their listeners understand Irish, having elaborate visual stories in their music videos was of the utmost importance. The film incorporates many of their pre-established storylines — from the cross-community relationship with a Protestant girl developed in their 2019 single “Fenian Cunts,” to their film rivals, the fictitious Radical Republicans Against Drugs, which they use to poke fun at the staunch anti-drug stance of republicans and which dates back to “Your All Legitimate Targets” off their mixtape. The band benefits from the medium of film pushing these storylines and viewer connection with the Irish language further through the use of subtitles when Kneecap speaks and raps.

A large portion of Kneecap is in Irish, a rarity in film, and an entirely different approach to The Quiet Girl, the 2022 primarily Irish language adaptation (which doesn’t have much dialogue at all) of Claire Keegan’s short story “Foster” that earned a Greatest International Feature Film nomination at the Oscars. While The Quiet Girl presents a quaint view of Ireland set in the 1980s, Kneecap and the band’s music takes the Irish language out of the past and into the raucous semi-present. 

Irish solidarity and beyond

“Hopefully when people see Kneecap, the movie and the music, they’ll see that it’s possible to do stuff in your own language,” said Bap. “We’ve met people who tell us the film makes them reflect on how they can be creative with the language, because even in Ireland for a long time, most people wouldn’t sing in Irish, and even worse, they’d sing in American accents.” 

Chara added that your native language can connect you to where you’re from, your history, your past, and the land. “Belfast doesn’t have a meaning [in itself], but it comes from Béal Feirste in Irish, which means ‘the mouth of Farset River that runs underneath Belfast,'” said Chara. “The list goes on everywhere in Ireland a name originates from Irish and was translated to English a long time ago.”

The group and their championing of the Irish language is ultimately a reaction to their people’s history of being colonized and England’s attempt at erasing Irish culture. But Kneecap isn’t only concerned with the Irish cause. The film ends with a PSA noting that an Indigenous language dies every 40 days. The group made headlines when they dropped out of SXSW in solidarity with Palestine. Kneecap’s attitude has earned them the respect of politically aware Gen Z fans. 

“We’re very good at history and remembering stuff in Ireland, and we’re very bitter and resentful, so we never, never forget. But the history repeats itself,” said Bap. “We understand the importance and the impact that solidarity can have on people, and we see that now in Palestine. That’s why it’s important for us to make sure people feel seen, heard, and not dismissed.”

Kneecap is in theaters Aug. 2.