Charlie Bird's final scoop: The inside story of Ransom ’79 and its Schull premiere
Ransom '79: Charlie Bird and Colin Murphy.
New Irish documentary Ransom ’79 tells the story of iconic journalist Charlie Bird’s efforts to get his final big story. A storyteller to his core, Bird wasn’t going to let his struggles with motor neurone disease prevent him from getting his last ‘scoop’.
As Bird himself puts it in the film: “I have a terminal illness, but I still have my journalistic nose for a good story,” he says, adding that the project was “keeping me alive and focused”.
And what a story it is. In 2021, Bird got wind of the existence of a secret operation to thwart a major ransom threat against the State in 1979.
A criminal gang, he learned, had threatened to upend the Irish economy by releasing Foot and Mouth disease into the national cattle herd, unless the State paid a ransom of £5 million. Communicating their threats through anonymous letters, the gang compelled authorities to respond through personal ads in the Irish Times. The film will be screened on the opening night of this year’s Fastnet Film Festival in Schull.
“It was the first project that we discussed,” said the film’s director Colm Quinn, who would later work with the RTÉ reporter on the documentary Charlie Bird: Loud and Clear.
“We met with John Kelleher, the producer. Charlie had just done a podcast and he was really excited about the idea that it could be turned into a documentary. There were so many amazing elements to the story, not least the back and forth between the guards and this criminal gang via the ad section of the Irish Times.
“Charlie felt that by itself it was such an absolutely compelling and unique story in so many ways. He really felt it should be told as a feature documentary, as did we. But then obviously, the context changed, and it was Charlie facing motor neurone disease, but also still very much committed to telling this story.”
In Ransom ’79, Bird joins forces with fellow journalist and writer Colin Murphy, with whom he had collaborated on the play A Day in May. That was adapted from a collection of interviews Bird had done with LGBT people, their families and friends, around the time of the Marriage Referendum.
“Essentially it became a two-hander then, it was Charlie Bird working with his good friend Colin Murphy, to get into this story, and to do the interviews and do the research. That became the core of the dynamic," says Quinn.
Ransom ’79 is the celebration of Charlie in the present moment, doing what he does best - chasing a story, chasing leads, interviewing people, connecting with people, putting the pieces together. That’s what we wanted to capture, that real sense of purpose and drive and meaning that Charlie got from his work. And that the diagnosis wasn't going to get in the way of that.
“I think there are one or two difficult themes in the film where Charlie is dealing very much with the effects of motor neurone and Colin is there lending a very sympathetic understanding ear, but also being very pragmatic in terms of how we were going to go about telling this particular story, and why Charlie even wanted to tell this particular story. He just had this amazing connection with Charlie in the film and has also been a brilliant contributor to the film behind the camera.”
There are almost thriller elements to the film as their investigation builds, and Quinn does a fine job of setting out the high-stakes consequences of a Foot and Mouth disease outbreak in 1970s Ireland. If the gang’s threats became a reality, there would have been very real and devastating impacts on Ireland agriculturally, economically, and socially.
“There's just layers upon layers of intrigue with this gang and whether they potentially could have released Foot and Mouth disease on the country,” says Quinn. “The fact that that landed as such a huge threat at the time, and the level of the response that it was met with, indicates where the country was at in ’79 - the fact that Foot and Mouth could have led to economic devastation.
“Charlie was always going to be the protagonist of this. For me at the start, that was the real hook, the fact that one of the greatest journalists we’ve ever had wanted to tell that story.”
- Ransom ’79 will be screened on Wednesday, May 22 at 8pm at the Schull Harbour Hotel, followed by Q&A with director Colm Quinn, producer John Kelleher, and associate producers Claire Bird and Colin Murphy. It will be released in Irish cinemas on May 24. Fastnet Film Festival runs May 22-26
This year’s Fastnet Film Festival is packed with screenings and masterclasses reflective of the Schull festival’s growing status in the Irish and international film community.
Participants at this year’s festival include producers Ed Guiney and David Puttnam, filmmakers Lenny Abrahamson and Paddy Breathnach and actors Paul Mescal, Daisy Edgar-Jones and James Nesbitt.
Over 200 short films and 18 feature-length films will be screened over the course of the festival from Wednesday 22nd to Sunday 26th of May.
Filmmaker Gerard Stembridge will lead a Horror Symposium over the weekend. As part of this, the horror classic Nosferatu will be screened at Holy Trinity Church on Colla Road in Schull on May 23rd. The film will be accompanied by a newly composed live score by Irene Buckley and Linda Buckley, with performances by Rhoda Dullea on organ, Ilse de Ziah on cello, and Karen Dervan on viola.
Other festival highlights include special screenings of West Cork filmmaker Pat Collins’ That They May Face the Rising Sun, Dermot Malone’s drama King Frankie and Andrew Gallimore’s One Night in Millstreet, about the high-stakes fight between Steve Collins and Chris Eubank in Green Glens Arena in 1995.
Director Lenny Abrahamson, who brought Normal People to our screens, will host a discussion with its two stars, Paul Mescal and Daisy Edgar-Jones.
This year’s special guest at Fastnet is James Nesbitt, who will be the subject of Greg Dyke’s The Big Interview, following a screening of Bloody Sunday.
Paul Laverty, a long-time collaborator with filmmaker Ken Loach, will host a screening masterclass, while the future of Northern Ireland will be the focus of filmmaker Alan Gilsenan’s The Irish Question, followed by a discussion and Q&A.
On Fastnet’s annual trip to Cape Clear for Lá Teanga na Gaeilge, producer and editor Cúán Mac Conghail will be interviewed, following the screening of the charming Irish-language drama Róise & Frank.
Oscar winners Ross White and Tom Berkeley, who last year brought viewers the powerful short An Irish Goodbye, will host this year’s quiz.
- For a full programme, see www.fastnetfilmfestival.com
