My Irish film awards for 2013

Although it pains me to say it, it has not been a particularly vintage year for Irish film. There were none released that were particularly bad per se, more that there was precious little to get excited about. That being said, for the second year in a row 2 Irish films will make it into my top 20 films of the year (one in my top 5). So positivity is necessary here. The ones that were good were really good. Instead of doing a list, I am going to do what I did last year and give out arbitrary and imaginary awards to those who deserved them. It is more fun to come up with silly names quite frankly. So without further ado…

The make me laugh and cry award (aka best Irish film of 2013) - Good Vibrations

This is a film that blindsided me this year. It tells the story of Terri Hooley, record shop owner, music producer, dreamer and bad husband who brought punk to Belfast in the 1970s and 80s. This film is an absolute joy to behold, emotional without being cloying, harsh without being brutal. There are tears and laughs in equal measure but crucially they are earned with a terrific tone and a great screenplay. Richard Dormer is terrific in the main role. The scene when he hears a certain record for the first time is just beautiful to behold. This is an absolute triumph and it is easily the best Irish film of 2013.

The ‘What’s Up Doc?’ award – Broken Song

The best Irish documentary this year was the wonderful Broken Song directed by Claire Dix. It tells the story of a group of young lads who rap. They are predominantly from the Finglas/Ballymun area of Dublin. Git and Costello have a father/son relationship which they both seem to draw on for lyrical inspiration. They also try to mentor some of the younger kids of the area. The songs themselves are lyrically brilliant, the content reflecting lives lived and dreams that slipped away. Into this comes singer/songwriter Willa Lee, who has a voice most singers would kill for. But he is also a troublemaker and a little bit too lazy. Dix delves lightly into their pasts but without reducing the film to working class misery porn which can happen in films such as this. At its heart, Broken Song is a simple story well told. And it is all the better for it.

The ‘overnight sensation’ award - Paul Duane

If you do not know who he is now he will be more familiar to you in 2014. Duane has had a superb year with Barbaric Genius released on DVD, a superb documentary (Natan) on the way, and a TV show about to air on RTE and BBC 4 (Amber). If that is not enough Variety only went and named him on their highly prestigious 10 Directors to watch in 2014 list. He is an all round good egg and very entertaining on Twitter (@MrPaulDuane). Mark my words this time next year he could be announced as the director of Transformers 5. We can only hope he can resist the lure of Hollywood and keep making the quality Irish films he has been making.

The ‘this kid’s got something’ first film award - Gerard Barrett Pilgrim Hill

Pilgrim Hill was released to talk of an instant classic and of a serious talent to behold. The talk of a masterpiece doesn’t help either the filmmaker or Irish film in general. Pilgrim Hill is not a masterpiece but it is a good enough film to suggest the birth of a major Irish filmmaker. The story of Jimmy Walsh and his life on his farm is lean, beautifully shot and very confident. It has a feeling of authenticity rarely seen. You get the feeling that Barrett and lead actor Joe Mullins know this terrain very well. They have carved out a memorable and low key film with a great central character at the heart of it. I cannot wait for Barrett’s next film to come along.

The 1^st Annual ‘just release the f*cking film will ya’ award – Tin Can Man

This is an easy winner. It is Tin Can Man by Ivan Kavanagh. It will be the same winner every year until this film gets a cinema release. Seriously people you have no idea how good this film is. Hassle your local TD. It needs to be seen.

A couple of honourable mentions. Citadel by Ciaran Foy was a very interesting film that fell away into genre conventions a little too much. But there is more than enough to suggest that he will make something excellent in the future.

It has not been on general release yet but the excellent documentary Where I Am by Pamela Drynan is a terrific and humbling story of what happened to American writer Robert Drake. It did screen in the IFI over the summer so I do not know if is getting a general release. It has been an excellent year for Irish documentaries as evidenced by the above choices and I have still to see The Summit! I will do so soon.

So that is it for 2013. Keep your eyes peeled on the blog for an article on Irish cinema in 2014 which I will publish over the next couple of weeks.  

Dublin Film Festival 2013 Reviews - #1 Natan

There is nothing more satisfying to me than being surprised. I consider myself a proper cinephile so when I see a film about cinema that I know practically nothing about, it makes me happy. If the film is illuminating and interesting as well, that is close to the perfect evening at the cinema for me. If the documentary happens to be about film then I am in hog heaven! For my first trip to the Jameson Dublin International Film Festival this year I chose Paul Duane’s (Barbaric Genius) and David Cairns’ Natan and I was not disappointed.

Natan tells the remarkable story of Bernard Natan, a Romanian immigrant who came to Paris in 1905 and became involved almost immediately with French cinema. After fighting for France in World War I he received French citizenship. He immediately got back into producing films which eventually led to him taking control of the Pathé film group in the late 1920s. Under his leadership Pathé went on to produce epic films such as Les Miserables. But Bernard Natan has become largely written out of French film history for various different reasons. I will not go into details here as the story is an excellent one, suffice to say that his ethnicity and subsequent rumours plagued Natan almost from the start of his career. His ‘comeuppance’ for his alleged transgressions is at the heart of this devastating documentary.

Duane and Cairns tell the story using the traditional talking heads method but they also employ a terrific ‘ghost’ voiceover technique which lends the film an eerie feel. This ‘character’ speaks for Natan, and adds a layer to the visual images on show. It works wonderfully. This is one of those stories you cannot believe you didn’t know about already. What takes it beyond merely entertaining to very important is the fact that the film is making an ambitious attempt to reclaim a place in film history for a pioneer who was shockingly treated. This is important and the main reason I hope Natan will get a wider release.  Somebody suggested during the Q & A that this would make a terrific feature film and I would have to agree. But see the documentary first and be astonished at this fascinating piece of work.

My Irish films to see at Jameson Dublin International Film Festival

There are quite a number of Irish films showing at this year’s festival so how do you know which ones to see? The answer is you don’t! That is the wonderful thing about film festivals, the film you are most looking forward to can be a let down, and a film you have very little expectation from can surprise and delight you. This is the wondrous thing about cinema and the main reason I am obsessed with it. With this in mind here are the Irish films I will be seeing at this year’s festival. You can expect full reviews of these films soon (not sure when, as I am attending 17 films at the festival this year!).

1. The Good Man

Starring The Wire’s own Tommy Carcetti, Aidan Gillen stars as Michael, a banker (boo!) whose life begins to unravel after an accident. It is the unexpected collision with another mans life, Sifoso, in Cape Town that will ultimately be his reckoning. There is the possibility that this film will descend into cliché but I am optimistic that we will get something here that will say something about ourselves and the world in general.

Screening: 16^th February 4pm Cineworld 11

2. Where I Am

This documentary tells the story of Robert Drake, an American writer who was viciously assaulted and left for dead by two men in Sligo in 1999. Left permanently brain damaged and unable to walk, Drake was painted as a predatory gay man at the trial of his assailants. The documentary follows Drake as he returns to Ireland over a decade later. This is a story I knew very little about and it is a film I am really looking forward to seeing.

Screening: 16^th February 6.45pm Lighthouse 1

3. Broken Song

This unlikely documentary follows three Dublin men, Git, Costello and Willa Lee who see themselves as street poets, hip hop artists and songwriters. This film raises the intriguing question: namely can we see past people’s roots and upbringing and see what is inside? As a working class northsider myself I am fascinated by my own response to the question. We may have a Pyjama Girls for young men on our hands here.

Screening: 19^th February 6.10pm IFI 1

4. Jump

‘Jump follows the lives of four twenty-somethings whose lives collide one fateful New Year's Eve amidst the ancient walls of Derry, Northern Ireland in a night of fast talk, accidents and intrigue.’ To be honest this is the kind of all too familiar description that makes me nervous going to see some Irish films. But should it have more than the description suggests we could have a real winner on our hands.

Screening: 19^th February 9pm Lighthouse 1

5. Milo

This is the story of 10 year old Milo who is unaware that he suffers from a rare genetic disease. His parents keep him under strict control but invariably real life gets in the way. This Irish/Dutch co-production could be a small gem but the real worry is if the script is strong enough to sustain a feature as the story seems quite slight. I hope to be pleasantly surprised.

Screening: 23^rd February 3:45pm Cineworld 11

6. The Moth Diaries

I do not even know where to begin with this one. An IFB co-funded horror film from the director of American Psycho should really sell itself but bad reviews seem to have sunk its chances. I will approach it with an open mind as I am a fan of the director and of its Irish star Sarah Bolger but this one worries me the most.

Screening: 23^rd February 6pm Cineworld 8

One to note: Natan

Irish filmmaker Paul Duane’s Natan, about a French film pioneer largely forgotten should certainly be a must see for people who are interested in film history (I will be there). I was a big fan of his film Barbaric Genius  and although this is a film  not set in or about Ireland it is directed by a fine Irish filmmaker.

Screening: 15^th February 6.10pm IFI 1

One to avoid: The Hardy Bucks Movie

Now I know I said that you should keep an open mind but this is a film I would sell a kidney to avoid. It sold out quite quickly so I could not see it anyway but not being a fan of the show or the trailer for the film, I am fine with missing out. Using the classic TV show trope of sending the cast on holiday (Euro 2012 here) this one seems destined to be awful. But who knows, maybe it will ‘buck’ the trend (see what I did there). Knowing what I know about cinema then, I expect this to be a huge box office success.

Screening: 18^th February 8.15pm Lighthouse 1

Honourable mentions for films I won't see at the festival but have heard good things about are The Summit and Black Ice. I am sure i will see these two in the future.

If you would like to purchase tickets for these films or any others here is the link: http://www.jdiff.com/index.php/guide/guide/buying_tickets

 So these are the films I will be seeing.  Have you got some other Irish films you will be seeing? Let me know below.

Film Review - Barbaric Genius (2012)

Barbaric Genius is a fascinating film to review in the light of the previous review on this blog: Ballymun Lullaby. In Ballymun Lullaby the potential of children to soak up the right kind of education is clear to see. You approach the teaching of any subject from the right angle and children will devour it hungrily. But this does not end at a fixed point in childhood. In Barbaric Genius, Paul Duane’s powerful documentary, this is clearly also true of adults. For the subject (John Healy), his shot at redemption is at the age of 30. The background to John Healy’s life is the stuff of dreams for a documentarian. The son of Irish parents, Healy started drinking at an early age. This led to a spell of about 11 years as a vagrant, a subject which Healy has a lot to say about. It was this time too that led to various stints in prison. While in prison his interest in chess is piqued by the description of it as akin to stealing. It is this, the most basic of life lessons that changes everything.

But Healy was, and indeed is, no working class cliché. Taught to play chess by a fellow inmate, Healy was not satisfied just to play. Almost becoming a grandmaster, he played in, and won, many tournaments. The drive to become a grandmaster brought him stresses that made him give up chess but also help forge the compulsion to write. His need to put his remarkable energy into something resulted in his memoir, The Grass Arena, (the story of his difficult life). It was an instant sensation and brought with it fame and recognition. But it is the subsequent withdrawal of the book from print which is the main jumping off point for Duane’s film.

Healy is a reluctant interviewee. But it is clear that he has an interesting story to tell. Almost monosyllabic in a formal interview he becomes a warmer and more eloquent presence when he walks the streets that he lived on. In a lot of the shots, it is what he doesn’t say that captures the harshness of a previous life. It is in the close-ups of his hands that betray a life hard life lived: knotted, constantly moving, seemingly on high alert. It is in the distant stare of his eyes as he remembers people who he used to know, some now dead. Duane knows when to hold the camera on his subject, to let the viewer see the effects of Healy’s life on him now. This is subtle filmmaking and other documentarians should take note.

The story of his fall out with his book’s publishers is a fascinating one. Duane uses a classic filmmaker’s device of briefly mentioning it early in the film but not returning to it until later. This drawing out of the story works as there is so much more than that going on, but it is a risky and bold move. Duane uses interviews with various people at the publishing house to try and get at the truth of the falling out. Healy believes that it had to do with class and there is circumstantial evidence to support this theory. The truth is never quite clear but it is a fascinating story that won’t be given away here. Suffice to say that a misunderstanding and a clash of cultures is as good an explanation as there probably is. It would have been interesting to see Duane probe and question Healy a little more, but one imagines Healy says only what he wants to say regardless of the question.

Barbaric Genius is an apt title for this film. There is a sense from Healy that should he turn his mind to practically anything, his drive and dedication would see him try to perfect it. To see The Grass Arena back in print in the Penguin Classics series is a vindication of his life’s work. But this is not the clear triumph to send an audience home happy as it may appear initially. Healy still has financial worries to contend with. One also imagines looking at his eyes in close-up that there may well be some demons left to fight. Duane’s documentary does what all very good documentaries do: namely to give the audience the urge to learn more about the subject. In this case I will endeavour to read all of John Healy’s literary work. There is no finer recommendation for a film than that.

New Irish Film Trailer Barbaric Genius

This Paul Duane directed documentary looks at the extraordinary life of John Healy, a London Irish author. The trailer tells the background to the story more effectively than I could. It is showing now at the IFI in Dublin and should be worth a look. I am heading out of the country tomorrow for a few weeks so won't be able to see it to write a review.

Please let me know what you think of it. The trailer is below.