Christmas films are either depressing or Hallmark-y, and other critics bill So This Is Christmas as the former. The documentary’s first ten minutes or so don’t feel as depressing, as it shows families making cakes. But let’s wait a few minutes more until a posh-y single Irish woman talks about her eating disorders. Or single parents unable to afford decorations, or an older woman remembering the childhood abuse she experienced.

This documentary, as much as it subverts the average holiday schmaltz, isn’t one’s average feel bad film. Its approach is simple enough as it mixes straightforward elements like cinema verite and sit down interview scenes. But it splices those interviews well, as if these people from different class backgrounds speak as a whole. The cinema verite in So This Is Christmas reinforce the humanity in subjects breathing life into the holidays.

So This Is Christmas shows that life in Ireland is different even days before the holiday, as it shows us bare walls in a dining room of a single mother worrying about gifts for her children. This is a reality for many people in Ireland as well as the Western world. Viewers can see this truth by December but this film is a sobering reminder of how things are.

So This Is Christmas also shows us that its subjects’ personal lives are a reflection of Irish society, as the older woman talking about her abuse traces it to the power structure during the 1960s. Decades have obviously passed since then but there are still people like her who are living the consequences of others’ actions. As I write this, the film thankfully shows how she and other Irish people do their best to make their spirits bright. It’s all we can do, regardless of where we are celebrating.