Brendan Gleeson who, one must admit, doesn't look like a Hollywood star, has only occasionally been given his head in movies. But when faced with the opportunity, as in John Boorman's The General and Martin McDonagh's In Bruges, and now in The Guard, he proves himself a major player.
Here he plays Gerry Boyle, a veteran Garda sergeant in the west of Ireland, who, though basically honest, takes the world as he sees it.
Attending a car pile-up, he gulps the drugs he finds on one of the injured teenagers, and on his day-off entertains two cheery prostitutes dressed up as cops.
Added to that, he shocks the straitlaced American federal agent (Don Cheadle), who has arrived to investigate a local cocaine smuggling ring, by appearing to be amazed that the offenders weren't black.
When primly reprimanded, he replies, "I'm Irish. Racism is part of my culture." Boyle is a natural contrarian and it's his patch, so idiots from America and Dublin had better give over. Gleeson sees to it that you admire this man, perhaps a bit more than you should.
There isn't much of a plot in writer-director John Michael McDonagh's quirky comedy, but the witty screenplay rivals his brother's for In Bruges.
Meeting an IRA man, Boyle observes: "Didn't know you had gay lads in the IRA?" To which the young man replies: "Sure, it's the only way to infiltrate MI5."
Boyle's partnership with the Fed agent, which starts with mutual irritation but in the end produces respect, is one of the lynchpins of the film. The other is McDonagh's determination to puncture the pretensions of all things Irish without seeming to insult his own countrymen.
Spiteful, ironic and human in turn, The Guard is an entertainment that makes most of the year's American comedies look impoverished, and in Gleeson it has a palpable star.
The Guard
Cert: 15
