Writer-director Liam O Mochain spent more than three years filming this feature, a package of five narratively self-contained shorts set in various parts of Ireland. That either makes him heroically persistent about seeing his vision through or somewhat inept, as there’s no discernible improvement over the course of the film. Every one of these thudding tales is flatly directed and plays like the script was inspired by true stories from Take a Break magazine – although hopefully there’s nothing true about the would-be comical fourth story which (spoiler alert) ends with a woman (Gail Brady) getting locked inside a “smart” oven that’s about to turn itself on. It’s supposed to be funny because her husband (Matthew O’Brien) is so feckless about technology he doesn’t know how to turn the oven off. Because men, geddit?

The other instalments are a little better, but only by tiny amounts, much the way one flavour of off-brand crisps might be preferable to another. The first one at least has the always watchable redoubtable character actor Marion O’Dwyer playing Carol, a homeless woman still grieving her dead husband (she listens to his voicemail greeting several times a day). She breaks into a restaurant on Christmas Day to host a feast for her rough-sleeping friends. Similarly, a vignette about Molly (Rosemary Henderson) meeting the son she put up for adoption years ago is passable thanks to competent performances, but the O Henry-esque twist is very weak tea.

There’s less charm in a chapter about a middle-aged courtship which is also essentially a celebration of day drinking and co-dependency, and the whole package ends with another booze-fuelled good-luck story that tries to validate Ireland’s national obsession with gambling. Characterisation rarely rouses itself above stereotype-peddling here; at least it’s (mostly) in focus.

• Abode is in UK cinemas from 20 March.