Swing Bout: Cork boxing film enters the ring at Dublin Film Festival
Sinead O'Riordan in Swing Bout. Picture: Niamh Ahern
A gritty new boxing drama shot in Cork is among a number of new Irish films coming to this year’s Dublin International Film Festival. Set backstage at a major boxing event, Swing Bout revolves around a tumultuous night in the young boxing career of Toni (Ciara Berkeley) who becomes embroiled in a web of corruption.
For Cork-born actor and producer Sinéad O’Riordan, the film offered an opportunity to return to the city and shoot in one of its most-iconic sporting locations. The changing rooms and corridors beneath the famous stands at Páirc Uí Chaoimh double for the boxing venue where most of the key scenes take place behind the scenes of a big fight night.
It proved a godsend for the film’s largely Cork-based cast and crew as production got underway.
“Our location was a big, big thing for us, a big challenge,” says O’Riordan. "It needed to be authentic. We wanted that sort of underground, claustrophobic feel where you hear the audience and everything going on outside on the peripheral.
“So location was key, and we were very fortunate to film at Páirc Uí Chaoimh. Initially, we were going to try to build a set in a gym because a lot of it takes place in the locker room.”
As filming dates approached, she and her team approached stadium management and asked if they could rent the stadium or parts of the stadium. “It was for the month of January, which was a great month actually in the grand scheme of things because there wasn't much happening in January in the stadium. They couldn't be nicer to us. Oh my God, they bent over backwards for us. From the top down, to the cleaners, to the caterers, they were so good.”
Written and directed by Maurice O’Carroll (Dead Along the Way), Swing Bout revolves around the sporting dreams of female fighter Toni, who aspires to one day be world champion. But it’s early days in what is a tough sport to excel in, and Toni is on the cards for a swing bout, unsure if she’ll even get to fight in the tournament. The term refers to a fight that might be added to a schedule at short notice, usually if another fight ends early.
“It follows her journey from the dressing room to her ring walk,” says O’Riordan. “It's a night of deceit and betrayal and life-altering decisions. There's a lot of backstage drama, a lot of backstage tension.
“It really looks at the core values of our character and how she battles with being given this deal where she's asked to take a dive in the second round so that the other Swing Bout fighter can win. She’ll get paid for it. But she needs to stay true to her values.” The movie marks an impressive performance from Berkeley, an English actress who moved here to study at Trinity and decided to stay.
“You can just see that inner narrative that's going on in her head,” says O’Riordan, who plays Toni’s boxing coach in the film. “She actually has the least lines in the film and so her job was nearly harder. She did all that groundwork you need to do as an actor. She had a supporting role in Normal People. She’s definitely one to watch. She’s an amazing up-and-coming, emerging talent.”
From Ballyphehane in Cork city, O’Riordan dreamed of an acting career as a child but ended up having a successful career in engineering. “When I was six, I was a very shy child tied to the apron strings of my mum and she sent me to drama with Jacqueline O'Halloran. She was an amazing acting coach over the years and brought us through Feis Maitiu. That's where my love of it began.
“I really wanted to study acting in college but we didn't have the money to send me to Dublin at the time and definitely not London. So I ended up going down the engineering road. I got an honours degree in electronic engineering at CIT while dabbling in theatre and the theatrical scene at college at the same time. Then I went over to Silicon Valley for a couple of years, tested software for some high tech internet companies over there.”
On returning to Ireland, and starting her family, O’Riordan returned to acting. “I started doing some acting for camera classes and jumping into whatever course I could find.
“I set up my own production company (Orion Productions). I started off with theatre and I produced three plays, which did very well: Breathless with Ruth McCabe, The Motherfucker With the Hat, which was a brilliant play, and I did another play called The Woolgatherer. It was around then that I met Maurice, I auditioned for a short film that he was doing and when I met him, we were like kindred spirits.”
The filmmaking duo have since worked on a number of shorts and will attend the world premiere of Swing Bout at this year’s Dublin International Film Festival.
Opening on Thursday, February 22 with the world premiere of Marian Quinn’s Twig, Dublin International Film Festival will feature dozens of Irish and international premieres, screenings, guests Q&As and events. Here are some movies to watch out for:
Christine Molloy and Joe Lawlor’s film tells the story of Rose Dugdale. The English heiress rebelled against her wealthy upbringing and became involved in the IRA. She was central to the notorious art theft at Rossborough House in 1974. Imogen Poots and Tom Vaughan-Lawlor star.
Actor and traditional Irish music lover Brendan Gleeson returns to Hughes’s pub in Dublin, a centre of traditional Irish music in the city for decades, as it closes its doors for the last time.
This critically acclaimed Romanian film follows an overworked production assistant as they film a health and safety video for a multinational company. What follows is a scathing comedy about corporate greed, worker exploitation and the gig economy.
This Indian action drama revolves around two brothers who witness the kidnapping of a baby and joins forces with the baby’s traumatised mother to investigate.
Actor Hiam Abbass left her native Arab Israeli village to pursue an acting career. Decades later she returns with her filmmaker daughter to piece together a personal account of her family’s history.
Cork filmmaker Pat Collins’ highly anticipated adaptation of John McGahern’s acclaimed novel is DIFF’s closing-night film. The story of a couple who return from London to the community where he grew up stars Barry Ward and Anna Bederke.
