Wilbur & Anto, the debut short film by director Lee Cronin, and ‘Hanging About’ by the Ballymac Youth Project and Old Museum Arts Centre, Belfast have won
Best Film at Cinemagic Young Filmmaker 2004 in association with Warner
Village Cinemas at the Odyessy Arena in Belfast.
This years festival gave eighteen blossoming young filmmakers from across Northern Ireland, the UK and Ireland the chance to screen their films on the big screen. In addition, the winning entries from each category will screen their films at the Cinemagic World Screen Festival for Young People in December.
The judging panel, consisting of Ralph McLean, BBC Northern Ireland presenter, Karen O’Hare, BBC Northern Ireland and Brian Henry Martin, Double Band Films selected the short film alongside comedy, drama and documentary.
“The standard of entries in both the under 18 year old and 18-25 year old categories for Cinemagic Young Filmmaker was extremely high. The technical skill and creative flair exhibited by individual filmmakers, schools, community groups and arts projects who submitted films is a very positive indication of the talent that will drive the film and television industry forward.” Ralph McLean
Jeff O'Toole
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Wilbur
& Anto, the debut short film by director Lee Cronin, won Best
Film in the 18-25 age group. The 20 minute short is described as a comedy mockumentary. Starring Jeff O'Toole
(Intermission, Accelerator) and Ned Dennehy
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(Veronica Guerin, Reign of Fire), it
tells the story of the two titular characters and how far they will go for, em,
feet! Anto is a student at the National Chiropody College of Ireland who is
trying to get to the top of his profession by impressing Doctor Vincent Van
der Vogel who is the guru in the chiropody world. Wilbur is a cleaner at the
college and his love of feet is a little more perverse. He wants into the
college so he can gaze longingly at women's feet all day long.
Lee beat off competition from seven other shortlisted entries to take the top prize. Speaking to IFTN about the win he said "I am delighted to have won as this is the
first festival screening of the film. Everyone who watches it responds well,
it gets laugh after laugh after laugh. The performances are very strong and
the story plays out well. There were some very important industry people at
the event and they had lots of good things to say about it too." He now hopes to submit the film to Galway, Raindance and Edinburgh film festivals later in the year.
The Cinemagic Festival is supported by Arts & Business New Partners
For further information about Wilbur & Anto contact leecronin@msn.com