Irish Festival News: Yellow Fever & Lightbox | The Irish Film & Television Network

Lightbox Festival

Cinema North West and Sligo’s The Model cinema have, this summer, launched a dedicated Irish Animation festival which will take place in Sligo on the 19th and 20th of June entitled Lightbox. The festival is presented in association with Dublin’s Darklight Film Festival, and collective Synth Eastwood and the weekend-long event will look to present family friendly programmes as well as more challenging fare alongside industry events all of which will focus on Irish animation work from shorts and music videos to full length features.

Screenings will be held in the renovated Model cinema in Sligo and the Cinema NorthWest Cinemobile. These will include a profile of the hugely successful Irish animation company, Cartoon Saloon with a showing of the group’s IFTA winning feature ‘The Secret of Kells’ alongside a special selection of their work from the past few years. The festival will also look in depth at the work of Jimmy Murakami, a founding father of Irish animation with the screening of a new documentary about his life; ‘Jimmy Murakami, Non Alien’, which fits in with a rare screening of his 1986 cold war feature film ‘When the Wind Blows’.

There will be several other family and child friendly screenings including Ponyo, the latest innovative work from the acclaimed Studio Ghibli, creators of such modern classics as ‘Spirited Away’ and ‘Howl’s Moving Castle’. Also showing will be the award winning ‘Lost and Found’, adapted from the quirky and beautiful children’s book by Oliver Jeffers. Lightbox is also bringing the Darklight Festival programme of innovative short animation to Sligo, hosting a salon style chat with various animators (who are TBC) in Animators Anonymous. Festival will also stage an exciting one-off music/art/film event by group Synth Eastwood as part of the festival.

A special Kids Weekend festival pass is available for €10, which allows entry to all suitable, kids events at Lightbox. Adult weekend passes are €25, and day passes are €15, with individual tickets available for features too. Tickets are available from The Model by calling the box office on 071 9141405 or by emailing tickets@modelart.ie. For a full programme see www.themodel.ie/film/lightbox Lightbox runs from Sat 19th to Sunday 20th June and is brought to you by Cinema North West and The Model, in association with the Darklight Film Festival and Synth Eastwood.

Yellow Fever Independent Film Festival

August 2009 saw Northern Irish film maker George Clarke orchestrate the very first Yellow Fever Independent Film Festival at the Stormont Hotel in Belfast. Movies and guests came from Hong Kong, America, the UK and Ireland,

This year’s event will see an extra day added to proceedings with the festival kicking off on Friday, August 27th and running until Sunday, August 29th. The film festival also has the addition of the all new 'YellowCon', an entertainment section to the weekend that involves the Arkham Gaming Centre for role playing games, a Cosplay show and contest, Console Tournament and more. Yellow Fever founder George Clarke explains the reason behind this move: ”I wanted to add a bit more of a comicbook convention to the festival, and bring the feel of an American underground event to NI.” he says.

George further explains to us his reasoning behind introducing another new feature of this year’s event – the 1 Minute Movie Contest saying: “Last year there wasn't enough local produce. With only a few entries from NI, my plan for using the festival as a 'gateway to independence' for local film makers, wasn't as I had planned.” Thus this year George has launched the aforementioned 1 Minute Movie Contest. “We thought we'd try something a little different and give everyone a chance to get a film screened so we’ve introduced the 1 Minute Movie Contest! It only costs £1 to enter (and you can pay via the tab at our webstore or send a shiny gold coin along with your entry) and your film has got to be, well, 1 minute long.”

Submitted films can be about anything. Judges at the YFIFF will select 60 of the best and run them over the course of the event, with a range of prizes to be awarded at the official YFIFF award ceremony, for 1st, 2nd and 3rd places. The audience gets a say in picking the winners, so get your camera at the ready and take a minute - to make a minute. All entries must be sent in on DVD (or arranged to be Skyped through) by June 30th. For more information click here (or email info@yellowfeverproductions.co.uk).

The Yellow Fever Independent Film Festival will run from August 27th to 29th in the Stormont Hotel in Belfast.

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