Based on the infamous story by James Joyce, The Dead is an unhurried film detailing a New Years celebration in Dublin, 1904. Two spinster sisters, Aunt Julia and Aunt Kate along with their niece Mary Jane, welcome middle class guests into their home for an evening of culture and music. Their only concern is that, their friend, Freddy Malins won’t arrive too drunk.
Among the attendees are Gabriel Conroy, their nephew, and his wife Gretta. Gabriel is a self-conscious micro-intellectual. None too pleased to be attending the party, preferring to be somewhere more eventful he feels superior to the other guests, and considers adjusting his after dinner speech, so that none of his reference elude. During the evening he dances with Molly Ivors, a republican who chastises Gabriel for his unpatriotic behavior, as he prefers to take his holidays on the continent rather than in the West of Ireland.
As the evening draws to a close, he sees his wife standing by the stairs, listing attentively to a ballad “The Lass of Aughrim”. The look on Grettas’ face is not one that Gabriel is familiar with, she seems transfigured. On the homeward journey, he notes his wives delicacy and stillness, indeed he is enchanted. However while his affection grows, his wife is increasingly detached. Back at the hotel, Gretta tells him how the song, reminded her of a young boy she loved years ago back in Galway. The boy Michael Furey, who was ill, came through a storm one night to see her and subsequently died. Gabriel is deflated, realizing not just the insignificant place he held in his wife emotions all evening, but also the enduring enigma surrounding her former life in the West. He has never loved like Michael or Gretta; thus Gabriel comes to realise the difference between existing and living.