Cork Film Festival: A cornerstone

When the Cork Film Festival was established 63 years ago, it offered an annual window to an exotic world of minor starlets in never-seen-before ball gowns.

Crowds gathered at cinemas to cheer Hollywood’s visiting circus; for a few days, the whole city was starstruck.

Since then, the festival has evolved and inspired a second film festival — the IndieCork Film Festival.

The Cork Film Festival, which closed its 2018 programme last night, has become a cornerstone in the region’s annual cultural cycle. Along with the jazz and folk festivals, early music and food festivals, and many other events, it is an annual celebration that adds greatly to the fabric and substance of the region’s cultural and social life.

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This year, the Folk Festival marked its 40th year by commissioning a piece from harpist Mairéad Ní Chathasaigh. Maybe the Film Festival should follow that lead and commission a film telling the story of the festival’s first 65 years to be shown in 2020? Telling that story would show how utterly this society has changed and how influential film has been in that process. Lights, camera, reflection...