Wednesday May 4th will see a special Irish Spotlight event running as part of the 12th annual Newport Beach Film Festival. The Spotlight screening has been announced as the Orange County premiere of Fastnet Films’ IFTA winning feature, ‘The Runway’ alongside screenings of Blinder Films’ ‘Sensation’ and Peter Flynn’s feature documentary, ‘Blazing the Trail: The O’Kalems in Ireland’.
On May 4th Ian Power’s IFTA winning film ‘The Runway’ will screen as the official Irish Spotlight feature of the festival. ‘The Runway’ is written and directed by Ian and tells the true story of a South American pilot who crash landed his plane into a field in Mallow, Co. Cork in 1983. Newport Beach Film Festival CEO, Gregg Schwenk has voiced his delight at the choice of the feature as the Spotlight film, saying: “‘The Runway’ is a deftly crafted film that clearly reflects the diversity and strength of Ireland’s film industry.”
The Newport Beach Film Festival will also screen several other Irish films during its eight day run. These will include Ripple World Pictures’ moving feature, ‘Parked’; Blinder Films alternative rural film, ‘Sensation’; Maurice Linnane’s roadtrip movie, ‘A Kiss for Jed Wood’; Juanita Wilson’s ‘As If I Am Not There’ and Nadia Tass’ bittersweet comedy ‘Matching Jack’. Domhnall Gleeson’s black comic short, ‘Noreen’ will show as part of the festival’s Short Films programme.
Where factual projects are concerned, audiences will also be privy to Peter Flynn’s feature documentary, ‘Blazing the Trail: The O’Kalems in Ireland’ which examines director Sidney Olcott and actress, Gene Gauntier who travelled to Kerry from the New York based, Kalem Film Company to produce a series of several film projects in Ireland, including ‘The Lad from Old Ireland’, one of the first major fiction films to be made in Ireland.
The Newport Beach Film Festival attracts approximately 52,000 attendees to Southern California annually. Committed to enlightening the public with a strong international film program, the festival focuses on showcasing a diverse collection of studio and independent films from around the globe. The twelfth annual event will run this year from April 28th until May 5th. For ticket information and updates visit www.NewportBeachFilmFest.com
