The title Am I Here? is a challenge to anyone who has ever stepped over, brushed past or otherwise ignored a homeless person. It is, in other words, a challenge to all of us.
“You feel like you’re invisible,” John says as he huddles in a doorway. “Sitting here with a cup makes you look like a bum. People don’t know my past.”
That past includes the suicide of an uncle that sent John into a “spiral of drug addiction”. His story is typical of those interviewed by Alex Fegan in this humane and quietly provocative film (RTÉ One, Monday, 9.35pm). Fegan makes the stylistic choice to shoot his subjects head-on. This forces the viewer to do something few of us have ever managed in real life: look a homeless person in the eye.
“When you’re homeless on the streets you meet all sorts of people,” says Carrie, who ended up sleeping rough after her parents died in the pandemic. “You’re meeting people who are on drugs, who have a very bad habit.
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“Most people you meet on the streets have a drug problem, people who have a drink habit. People that are lost. Something is broken in them ... Most people that I’ve met are broken inside from a trauma in their life.”
Fegan pops up on RTÉ every 18 months or so with a documentary that explores a facet of everyday Irish life. These films can be hit or miss: The Irish Wedding, from 2021, was well intentioned but didn’t have much of anything to say about knot-tying in 21st-century Ireland.
The humanity that courses through his film-making is better suited to the subject of homelessness. He gives the dozen or so people he interviews the space to express themselves – to talk candidly about drug addiction, childhood abuse and the physical and emotional agony of sleeping rough.
What he discovers is that there is no such thing as a generic homeless person. Behind each figure slumped in a doorway is a different story, a different trauma.
But optimism is mixed in with the misery. A (non-homeless) friend of Martin’s explains how they forged a bond after the kids he hung out with as a child stole the rings she sold at a stall. “I’ve watched Martin be neglected by the State,” she says, although she speaks warmly of their happy times together, such as a day out at the seaside.
The generosity that the homeless encounter is acknowledged too. Natasha describes a shop owner giving her a warm jumper. And the film concludes with Carrie back on her feet. A woman has offered her work as a cleaner, and now she hopes to make something of her life. “I’m proud of myself,” she says. “I wish now it all stays smooth.”
To describe this as a happy ending would be going too far. Still, Fegan has to be credited for letting some light into this bleak portrait. Am I Here? is an indictment of Ireland – but also a reminder that, even in the worst situations, there are good people and that sometimes a simple act of kindness can make all the difference in the world.
