The recently-formed Irish Screen Commission has appointed independent filmmaker and former public relations consultant, Roger Greene, as its first chief executive. The commission was set up earlier this year to promote Ireland as a film location internationally, and to facilitate both incoming and indigenous productions by providing information on a one-stop basis. During the mid-1980s, Mr Green acted as public relations consultant to Strongbow Film and Television Productions, Ardmore Studios and the Irish Film Institute, before founding Charlemont Films in 1987. Among the documentaries he has produced are Dead Man's Doctor, St Patrick's And The Tiger and Down For The Match. For the past four years he has been lecturing in Media at the University of Lincolnshire and Humberside, and directing live television coverage of horse racing for Sky Sports.
After protracted negotiations, the long-envisaged Academy of Irish Film and Television is finally coming to fruition, with the appointment of a chief executive officer, Fionnuala Sweeney, and the establishment of an office in Temple Bar. The academy has been set up by the five television broadcasters on the island, along with the Irish Film Board, the Irish Screen Commission, the Film Institute of Ireland, Film Makers Ireland, PACT and the Northern Ireland Film Commission. The organisation's chief aim will be to set up an awards scheme "to promote the excellence of Irish film and television", according to Fionnuala Sweeney, so it will be filling both the gap left by the demise of the Jacobs' Awards for broadcasting and meeting the perceived need for awards to promote the expanding film industry. It is widely anticipated that 1999 will see the first round of awards, which will be voted on in various categories by the peers of the nominees. "We're working away on establishing various criteria at the moment," says Sweeney.
This autumn is proving to be one of the busiest times in years for Irish film production. In addition to Angela's Ashes, Ordinary Decent Criminal, Animal Farm (in which Pete Postlethwaite has been confirmed to star) and various television series, two other features are in production. Filming began on Monday in Co Donegal on what is currently known as Untitled Irish Comedy, about what happens when the unmarried male inhabitants of a small Irish village place an advertisement in an American newspaper for women to come and join them at their annual festival. The cast includes Ian Hart (who must be an honorary Irishman by now), Sean McGinley, Niamh Cusack and Ruth McCabe. Untitled Irish Comedy is produced by Uberto Pasolini (his first film since the hugely successful The Full Monty), written by William Ivory and directed by Aileen Ritchie. Accelerator is a fast-paced car chase drama, with a young cast from Dublin and Northern Ireland, which will shoot for seven weeks from early October. Directed and co-written by Vinny Murphy, the film is produced by Michael Garland and co-produced with British producer Simon Channing-Williams's Imagine Films.
Meanwhile Wild Horses, a dramatic love story starring Liam Cunningham, Orla Brady and Tony Doyle, finishes photography next week in Co Antrim, after a six-week shoot in Dublin and Wicklow. The feature-length drama is intended primarily for television, although the producers, Parallel Films and RTE, haven't ruled out a theatrical release. Directed by Syd Macartney (The Ambassador, The Canterville Ghost), Wild Horses is unusual as the first feature film in recent years in which RTE is the main investor.
The first feature film from writer/director Stephen Bradley, Sweety Barrett, will receive its world premiere at this year's Toronto Film Festival on September 12th, followed one week later by the European premiere at the San Sebastian Film Festival, where it has secured a competition slot. This tale of revenge in a small Irish town stars Brendan Gleeson, the most prolific man in Irish cinema, in the title role.
