LENNY Abrahamson's Adam & Paul, though released a mere two years ago, has already acquired the status of an Irish classic.
The news that Abrahamson and Mark O'Halloran, the grim comedy's writer, have embarked on a new project has, therefore, been greeted with some excitement. Garage, a drama of small-town life starring Pat Shortt and Anne Marie Duff, began shooting in Birr, Co Offaly earlier this week. Garage's cast also includes Don Wycherley and Brian Doherty.
A voodoo curse on Paxo
Last Monday evening, Reel News, not for the first time, found itself shouting angrily at University Challenge. Jeremy Paxman had just played a snatch of music at the competing teams and asked them to identify the 1987 comedy in which it appeared. All eight students - the cream of Pembroke College, Cambridge and University College, London - looked perplexed. Considering the production team had played the wrong song, this was hardly surprising. Jimi Hendrix's Voodoo Child (Slight Return) appears in Withnail and I. Voodoo Chile, an entirely different tune, despite the similarity of the titles, most definitely does not. We are still awaiting an apology from the BBC.
IFI heads for the hills
This autumn, the Irish Film Institute, keen to pursue its mandate to reach out beyond Dublin, is significantly expanding its programme of touring film packages. The flurry of nationwide activity, which will be supervised by Alice Black, recently appointed as regional development manager, begins tomorrow when the Lesbian and Gay Film Festival descends on Dundalk. The Louth town will host screenings of two documentaries on gay life. Other events now lighting out for the territory include the Stranger Than Fiction documentary festival, the French Film festival and the perennially revolting Horrorthon.
For details on the programmes, email Black at ablack@irishfilm.ie.
A Marvel-ous all-star brawl
The Avengers may be coming to cinemas. Fear not, readers. The studios are not threatening to disinter that notorious Ralph Fiennes atrocity. Nor indeed are they planning to in any other way sully our memories of the great 1960s television series. The proposed film will focus on an extraordinarily diverse coalition of Marvel superheroes that includes, among others, Thor, Captain America, Iron Man and The Hulk. Progress on a film of The Avengers, who first appeared in their own comic 43 years ago, has long been hindered by the fact that competing film companies own the rights to different heroes. Now that Marvel has its own mini-studio a deal does, however, seem possible.
Reports just made up by Reel News that Tom Cruise is to play Ant Man cannot be confirmed.
I spy TomKat's baba
Readers will have been appalled to hear of the scurrilous, mischievous and wholly untrue rumours suggesting that Suri, the hitherto unseen offspring of Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes, does not, in fact, exist. Those cynical gossips were shamed this week when websites published a revealing aerial photograph of the couple's mansion. Enlarge the picture several times, pull out your magnifying glass, squint hard and you can just make out a dark woman standing next to a tiny blur that could possibly be a baby. Or a Yeti. Or the Loch Ness Monster. That'll learn you. Vanity Fair has promised to unveil less ambiguous images next month.
Apocalypto now for Mel
The trade papers have been buzzing with the news that Disney is to honour its commitment to distribute Mel Gibson's Apocalypto. At no stage during the recent furore involving the star's anti-Semitic outbursts did anybody from Disney even imply the film might be dropped. Fox News has, however, suggested that the company tried to offload the picture to several independent distributors.
Apocalypto, an epic focusing on the decline of the ancient Mayan civilisation, will - protests permitting - open here early next year.
Phone boot
Disastrous news for civilised cinemagoers. The Irish Cellular Industry Association, a body representing the mobile phone business, has rejected calls from decent people for the blocking of mobile phones in cinemas. "While appreciating the concerns of those parties that are affected by the inappropriate use of mobile phones," said association director Tommy McCabe, "it is the ICIA's view that the use of jammers or interceptors would be a drastic response, disproportionate to the issues identified."
Is he kidding? Beating those cretinous sociopaths who answer their phones in cinemas to bloody, whimpering pulps may, just possibly, be a tad disproportionate. The responsible use of jammers sounds like common sense.
