Lights, camera, action! Cork International Film Festival reveals eclectic programme
Anna Garcea and Si Edwards of Cork International Film Festival, with artist Elinor O'Donovan, outside the Gate Cinema today. Picture: Larry Cummins
After an all-digital event last year due to Covid restrictions, Cork International Film Festival has announced a move back to cinemas for the 2021 event. At the launch of the programme on Thursday evening, organisers revealed details of a 'blended' event which will still have online viewing options, as well as live screenings in such venues as the Gate, Triskel and the Everyman.
The 66th incarnation of the festival kicks off a week of in-person events with highly-rated British film Ali & Ava on Friday, November 5, followed by a nine-day digital programme from Saturday 13th.
Included in a particularly strong documentary strand are films on such figures as politician Noël Browne, murdered journalist Lyra McKee, and American chef Anthony Bourdain.
Also, Cork sibling composers Irene and Linda Buckley have composed a new score for Fritz Lang’s 1927 classic, Metropolis, which will be played live at screenings at the Everyman.
As ever, the festival has an extensive programme of short films, bundled into themes for screenings of upto eight at a time, with winners of several competition categories automatically placed on the longlist for the Academy Awards.
Festival director and CEO, Fiona Clark said: “With 80 Irish and international features and documentaries, over 130 shorts, and new strands of Culinary Cinema, Green Screen, Guilty Pleasures, a major Female Visions retrospective, and a magnificent cine-concert, as well as our popular family and schools’ programme, we hope that this 66th edition of Ireland’s first and largest film festival will allow greater opportunities for everyone to discover film and reimagine the world.”
- Foscadh: An Irish-language drama based around characters created by Donal Ryan in his novel, The Thing About December. The title translates as 'Shelter', and it follows a 28-year-old recluse who has to engage more with the world when his parents pass away.
- The Dance: Acclaimed Cork documentary-maker Pat Collins focused his cameras on the equally renowned Kery-based choreographer Michael Keegan-Dolan as he worked on MÁM, a show that involved 12 dancers, concertina player Cormac Begley and an orchestral collective.
- Titane: A winner of the Palme d’Or at Cannes earlier this year, this body horror split critics somewhat, but still took the prize at the French festival for its heady mix of sex and violence.
- The Seven Ages of Noël Browne: Alan Gilsenan looks at the life of the Irish politician most famous for his work fighting TB, and his clash with the Catholic Church over health care.
- Beau Travail: Part of 'Female Visions', the festival's retrospective strand on women filmmakers, this screening offers a rare chance for a big-screen look at the masterful tale from 1999 about the French Foreign Legion and love in the deserts of Djibouti.
- Tickets and further details at corkfilmfest.org
