IFTN takes a look at festival news of Irish interest from around the world – with award wins for 'Cuckoo', screenings in San Paolo for 'Run and Jump', and Irish turf-cutting documentary on tour of US film festivals.
Run and Jump Screening at Sao Paolo International Film Festival
Steph Green’s debut feature film “Run and Jump” is currently screening at the 37th Sao Paolo International Film Festival ahead of its Brazilian release.
Fresh from a screening at the Irish Film New York Festival and an earlier appearance at the Galway Film Fleadh – where it won the awards for Best First Feature Film and Best Irish Feature respectively– ‘Run and Jump’ has screened to packed out audiences all week, and will see a widespread release in Brazil in early spring under Mostra Internacional De Cinema.
Partly funded by the Irish Film Board and the BAI, the film has already featured heavily on the festival circuit, with screenings at the Milano Film Festival, Montreal Film Festival, the Kerry Film Festival and the Shanghai International Film Festival, where producer Tamara Anghie is saying it is “resonating globally”.
Irish Web-Series ‘Cuckoo’ Wins Lovie Award
The cast and crew of Irish web-drama ‘Cuckoo’ will attend the third Lovie Awards in London on November 13th, in order to accept the third prize for their nomination in the Music and Entertainment category.
Selected by a panel consisting of actor Stephen Fry, Tweetdeck founder Iain Dodsworth and musician Imogen Heap, the soundtrack includes music from La Galaxie and Fox Avenue, and was awarded the joint third prize alongside Liam Gallagher documentary ‘Beady Eye’.
This latest award success features hot on the heels of the drama’s selection for the prestigious Webby Awards earlier this year, where it came fourth.
Directed by Dannan Breathnach and adapted from an original story by Nikki Raklin, ‘Cuckoo’ was produced by Marie Caffrey at Zanzibar Films and features a strong cast with Pagan McGrath (‘Titanic: Blood and Steel’), Brian Fortune (‘Game of Thrones’) and Denise McCormack (‘Love/Hate’) in leading roles.
The web-drama will also appear at the upcoming Geneva International Film Festival, set to run from the 31st October to 7th of November.
Irish Documentary ‘Home Turf’ To Begin Festival Tour
Fresh from a win for ‘Best Documentary Short’ at the Kerry Film Festival, True Films-produced ‘Home Turf’ will being a tour of the United States.
Dubbed by the Irish Independent as “an elegiac tribute to an Ireland rapidly disappearing”, the short documentary encapsulates the sense of loss felt by a small group of Irish turf-cutters who see the lifestyle and culture associated with the seasonal activity slowly succumbing to an increasingly mechanized industry.
Produced as part of the Irish Film Board’s ‘Reality Bites’ programme, the film was produced by Aideen O’ Sullivan and directed by Ross Whittaker, who was delighted with how the film “resonates with audiences internationally”, and credits this success to “themes like the unexpected impacts of progress and how rural life and a certain type of manliness has been negatively changed.”
The documentary will feature at the Mountain Film Festival in Colorado and Rural Route Film Festival in New York, screening over 20 dates in all.
