You run! Go!
Repeat after me.
The man walked to market with his sow.
The girl cut turf in the rain.
How do you cut turf?
With misery and despair, I'd say.
Not used to seeing you up here.
I'm covering.
Everything okay?
I think you need new Irish textbooks.
They are the new textbooks.
I'm not sure shoveling shite
is going to inspire these kids to learn Irish.
Turn it up.
Friends, what a momentous day...
So we'll be ramping up our campaign,
and counting on your support in the coming months.
We're only asking for the same language rights as the Scots
and the Welsh.
A country without a language is only half a nation.
That was the police.
What do they want?
An Irish translator.
I can't go. I was drinking.
It's translating, not driving an HGV.
I still have to drive to get there.
Then why did you say...
There's an Irish speaker in need.
Bullshit. If they speak Irish, they speak English.
It's not the Potato Famine.
Don't joke about the Famine.
Too soon?
With everything that happened today,
someone is probably taking a principled stand
for their language rights.
We need to...
We must support them.
If you could read,
you wouldn't be a fucking peeler now, would you?
Again.
- Hear. - Listen.
- Do. - Get.
- See. - Eat.
Give.
Again.
I'm making Irish speakers of them.
Irish speakers? Jailgeoirs, more like.
Aye. Curriculum of the colonizer.
Only one thing here getting disowned.
Quit your slabbering.
I'll show you some slabbering.
Get away to fuck.
Every word of Irish spoken...
...is a bullet fired for Irish freedom.
Tell her.
I'm not talking to anyone
who works for the fucking peelers.
I don't work for 'em.
Look which side of the table you're on.
- It's where the chair is. - Aye.
And why do you think that's where the chair was?
So why you doing this, with the Irish?
I hate the peelers.
Nothing to do with today's news?
What? What news?
Listen, I want out of here just as much as you.
I doubt that, all right.
How are you feeling?
Aye.
- Did you take... - I need a new prescription.
Why haven't you?
It's two minutes...
You get it for me tomorrow, okay, hen?
You need to get out.
Just this time.
You have to get out. Outside.
Quit lecturing me under my own roof.
You're never out from under your own roof.
That's the problem.
Will I make you something?
Aye, roast lamb with all the trimmings.
Tell her it flows a lot better in Irish.
- Poetry? - Scribbles.
And I need you to stop turning...
Time for you to decide what side of the table you're on.
She's asking you to prove a negative.
What?
By asking you to prove you can't speak English,
she's placing the burden of proof onto you, not her.
That's what I just said, right?
Here, have you got anything for...
...are you going tomorrow?
Where?
Will I say hello for you?
- Night. - Night, love.
Go to bed.
I'm saving myself for the big sleep.
It's not...
What operation?
Speak Irish to me.
It's a rollie.
Speak Irish to me.
You taught me Irish.
Fuckin' speak it.
Ma's getting worse.
She was asking about you.
No. She wasn't.
What?
For who?
Yep, I'd love to organize a memorial
for the week I thought my dad was dead.
That's a long fucking list.
Happy birthday.
Our day will come!
What are you doing here?
What am I doing in my own car?
What was all that about?
Cross-community running club.
Here, your lyrics...
They're great.
I've never read anything like them in Irish.
What I'm saying is would you be into making music?
People barely listen to Irish hip-hop,
let alone Irish hip-hop in Irish.
How do you know, when there's no hip-hop in Irish?
No cunt who listens to hip-hop speaks Irish.
Give them a reason to.
Why?
Right. Because Irish, it's like the last dodo.
Stuck behind glass in some zoo.
"Look but don't touch."
Like, someone needs to smash that glass
and set the dodo free so it can live.
What the fuck is a dodo?
Look, he says he's got a studio.
- Well... - And some beats.
- Sort of. - And he's a music teacher.
Wouldn't want to delay your meeting with Dr. Dre.
I'm offering a free spin of the wheel.
And if half of what's in those lyrics is true,
you need this more than I do.
Are we making music or fitting exhausts?
Well...
It's not Abbey Road.
Abbey what?
- Aye, I like that. - Yeah.
Here, give us a go.
- Fuckin' give us a go. - Stop!
Pissed off Sittin' around
No money in our pockets for going out
We're sick and tired of being skint
But that's all gonna change...
What are you doing?
I'm just tweaking the EQ.
Now I just need something to take the edge off.
We've got something for that.
- Well... - What's up?
- Lads. What are you doing here? - What?
Listen.
It's not a good time.
You said meet here to fucking go work on the tracks.
Did I?
I think that's what you said.
Like I said, it's not a good time.
- Tomorrow? - I don't know.
- Fucking weekend, then? - I can't.
I've paving slabs to lay.
What happened to smashing up the Irish language dodo?
No, smashing the glass to set the dodo free...
Whatever. I'll be in touch.
I'll be in touch.
- Who was that? - Who was who?
The two smicks you were fist bumping.
Them?
Just ex-pupils.
- You coming to the meeting? - Meeting?
Are you fucking kidding me? The meeting.
The Language Act Protest Committee.
I know.
I'd love to. I'd love to...
...but...
What? You've a puddle of piss to mop up?
Aye, there's that.
They want me to lead it.
Of course they do. You're brilliant.
I just don't know if it's me.
Listen. No one is anyone until they are.
Are you still fucking high?
Aye, a little bit.
What's Belfast famous for?
Bombings, George Best, baps.
By that logic, we might as well
call ourselves the Titanics.
Well, Kneecap's our name,
because I've already booked a gig.
We haven't even got a finished track.
I know, but that's not my fault.
Blame him.
Why are two fellas digging up our garden?
What are you doing?
Morning.
Where are the fucking paving slabs?
Yeah, we'll do the garden, you finish the track. Deal?
- No, no. I'll do it. - Sit down.
I'll do it. Let me do it.
It's not fucking Dancehall.
- What? - Come in on the chorus.
No, fuck that. I'm the lead.
R-I-G-H-T-S
I don't give a fuck about any Garda
Straight in, right?
So just, like, it's one, two, three...
Ready?
Rights
Where have you been?
At work.
- Our music is... - We know.
Have you seen the crowd?
I can't go out on that stage. Someone will see me.
I'm pretty sure that's the fucking point.
Take that.
I look like a fucking Provey.
DJ Próvai.
- I can't... - Come on.
- You said that was coke, right? - That's not coke.
Ketamine... That's fucking ket.
Fuck. Did you know?
Wrong pocket.
Great fucking drug dealer you are.
- Fuck. - We'll be fucking sweet.
Hear.
Listen.
Get.
Eat.
What?
Nothing.
What?
Nothing. Just that thing you do with your mouth.
What thing?
It's a twitch.
A twitch?
I don't do that.
Not anymore.
But you used to.
Back when you used to be
happy.
It's okay.
You kept my chair.
Thanks for going to my memorial.
I'm only saying it doesn't look very convincing
if my own wife doesn't show.
Still denying your native tongue?
I deny the ears that are hearing it.
Why?
So long as you don't have to leave this house to do it.
Over there.
Don't think so.
It's them.
It's definitely them.
Come on. Come on.
Lads.
How are you?
Can we talk to you?
About your music?
This is a big joke to you, isn't it?
Well, I'm not laughing.
Lads, you have to stop.
All right, it's not helping.
Helping what?
You know well.
The legislation, the Irish Language Act.
It's a politically sensitive time.
We have to consider
who are the best ambassadors for the language.
The only reason why the Irish language still fucking exists
is because people refused to not speak it.
No one's telling you not to speak it.
Once upon a time, a man told us
that the Irish language was like the last dodo,
stuck behind glass in some museum.
And to help it to survive,
we had to break the glass and set the dodo free.
That sounds like a terrible analogy.
Hello.
Radio?
Imagine the money.
How much do they pay?
Must be at least 10k a play.
The woeful pay-per-play rates of streaming platforms
mean that artists need millions of plays to make any profit,
so without radio money,
musicians' only revenue stream would be perpetual tours,
forcing multiple artists out of the industry every year
due to the associated mental and physical strain.
We'd better get to the studio.
Our music is backed up on the cloud, though, right?
We have to do something.
Do we fuck.
- Not you. - Not me?
It was my fucking garage.
I'm with Naoise.
Aye, go start a war with a paramilitary group.
The British empire couldn't win that one,
but I'm sure you'll do fucking fine.
If you two have a death wish, go ahead,
but don't drag me down with you.
Drag you down?
We've been dragging you along.
This is just a little hobby for you.
It's all we've got.
And they've destroyed everything!
Have they? Because the only one who can do that is you,
if you do something fucking stupid.
Now we need a mastered track for tomorrow
from scratch with no fucking equipment.
That's not going to fucking happen.
Look at this, boys.
The Roland 808.
What '80s shite is that?
1980 to 1983, to be precise.
Complete commercial flop,
but it got into the hands of enough people who mattered
to change the face of hip-hop music forever.
This is what we're meant to record the tracks on.
It's fucking fate.
Snare here and snare there.
To kick.
Two kicks, I think.
We'll bring one in here too.
That works. That works.
Right then, go ahead. He'll do the chorus.
I'm done, boys.
I'm out.
- What? - I can't do this anymore.
It feels like I'm fucking skiing
and both skis are going further apart.
I'm gonna tear my bollocks open.
I never wanted to ski.
I just wanted to be a musician, you know?
What do we do with this?
You'll work it out.
Breaking on to school property
outside school hours.
Contested or admitted?
Admitted.
Snorting a white substance on stage.
Admitted.
Indecently exposing your buttocks
to reveal the words "Brits" and "out"?
Admitted. Admitted! Admitted!
Admitted.
Membership of the music group
Kneecap?
- I... - I know.
You know?
My suspicions were aroused
when the lads started digging up our garden,
but it was your lovely arse
all over the news that sealed it.
I do have a lovely arse.
Why didn't you say something?
That twitch with your mouth...
You do it when you're happy.
I wanted to keep seeing it.
I quit.
Work?
No, fuck.
I was sacked from that.
Don't say I'm breaking up with you
for being in a band you're not even fucking in.
You're breaking up with me?
You've found what you were looking for.
That's great.
But I also need to do my thing.
You know?
They're different directions.
They don't work together.
What part of unemployed musician doesn't work for you?
No one is anyone until they are.
You are.
- Irish Language Act. - Now!
- Irish Language Act.
That was the radio plugger.
Stick the kettle on. I need your help.
But when they heard they were from West Belfast,
they wouldn't play it on the air.
This is an official complaint.
And good luck.
You speak Irish?
But I'm learning.
Listen, you cunts.
The Irish language and hip-hop go hand in hand.
I don't give a fuck what anyone says.
It gave a voice to the Black people of America.
And now, it's giving a voice to fucking Irish speakers!
But, Móglaí, they say we're politicizing the language.
It was them who politicized it
when they fucking banned it.
But it's obvious they failed
when you see all the Fenian cunts here tonight!
Speaking in our own tongue!
Giving shit to the peelers, the politicians, the dissies,
or any other cunt!
You go, lads.
I've got this.
That's not gonna happen.
Speak Irish.
Our day
will come.
I said you'd end up down an alley, didn't I?
What did I also tell you?
Every word of Irish spoken...
...is a bullet fired for Irish freedom.
What you're doing,
you're that bullet, son.
You better go.
Stories are built from language.
Nations are built from stories.
This is our story.