53rd Corona Cork Film Festival off to flying start: plenty of highlights to come

The 53rd Corona Cork Film Festival was in full swing this week after a gala opening night that saw Cork Opera House packed to the rafters for the Irish premiere of the Coen brothers’ spook spoof Burn After Reading, and eager film fans crowd city cinemas for Monday’s selection of documentaries, features and shorts.

Neither inclement weather nor stormy economic climes seemed to have dampened cinemagoers’ enthusiasm for Ireland’s oldest film fest, with many of the week’s top draws already sold out and seats in short supply for many more.

However with the festival offering eight days of film across six different venues, including no less than 45 programmes of short film, there is still plenty to see before the curtain falls on Sunday evening.

“There is a huge variety of films still to screen, with seats available for many of our gala shows as well as some top documentaries and programmes of short film,” according to festival press officer Eimear O’Brien.

“Patrons still have the chance to see some of the real jewels of this year’s festival lineup, including some highlights of our focus on New Arab Cinema and our programmes of Mexican short cinema,” she added.

Gala screenings in Cork Opera House include Fernando Mireilles’ Blindness (Wednesday 8.30pm), Peter Greenaway’s Nightwatching (Thursday 8.30pm,) and Choke (Saturday 8.30pm), based on the novel by cult author Chuck Palahniuk.

Pick of the documentaries still to be screened include Heavy Load (Wednesday 9pm, Triskel), Werner Herzog’s Encounters at the End of the World (Sunday 11am, Opera House), Niall Tóibín – Seó Man (Sunday 2.30pm, Kino) and Tyson (Sunday 6pm, Opera House).

Over 150 Irish and international guests have been flocking to Cork to join the fun, including filmmakers, industry executives, foreign festival delegates and movie media.

Noted festival guests include US director Rahmin Bahrani, whose Goodbye Solo was shown to great acclaim on Monday evening, Canadian super 8 filmmaker John Porter, British directors Terence Davies and Peter Greenaway, who will both give public talks in Cork as part of the festival, and comedian Paul Merton, who takes to the stage in Cork Opera House tonight to share his love of the “Silent Clowns” of Hollywood cinema.

The 53rd Corona Cork Film Festival which is taking place from October 12-19 will open with the screening of Burn After Reading which is the latest Coen Brothers Film and stars Brad Pitt and George Clooney. For eight days and eight nights the festival will screen over 300 films before closing with the screening of The Silence of Lorna which is directed by Jean-Pierre Dardenne and Luc Dardenne.

Michael Barry of Barry & Fitzwilliam, distributors of Corona Extra said 'As title sponsors of the Corona Cork Film Festival, we are proud to be associated with such a successful festival and to partner with them in bringing an interesting mix of feature films, short films and documentaries to Irish audiences'

A film not to miss is Hunger which won the Camera d'Or at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival and was written by Enda Walsh. Hunger tells the story of Bobby Sands, focusing on his final days of his hunger strike at the Maze Prison in 1981.

Well known to Irish audiences as a razor witted panellist on Have I got News for You, British comedian Paul Merton will attend the festival for the screening of his show Silent Clowns which combines screenings of memorable moments from the pre-talkie era with his own inimitable commentary. Further gems in the festival include Goodbye Solo which tells the story of a young Senegalese taxi driver who is hired by a stoic 70 year old man to help him commit suicide and Brideshead Revisited which is Julian Jarrold's latest feature.

The Corona Cork Film Festival is delighted to pay tribute to renowned British filmmaker Terence Davies who is one of the greatest celebrated directors. Terence Davies will attend the festival for the screening of Of Time and the City, a film which was highly acclaimed at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival.

Peter Greenaway will give the inaugural lecture in a series to commemorate the passing of a former Festival Director, Donal Sheehan and will also present his latest feature film Nightwatching. The Festival will also pay tribute to Robbie Ryan one of Ireland's leading cinematographers.

Leading the way in the international documentaries is Heavy Load a film about an English punk band that is made up of musicians with and without learning disabilities.

Remembering the Children deals with the fate of Jewish children under the Vichy regime in France while Blast is about an international team of astrophysicists who travel from the Artic to the Antarctic. An Irish documentary of note is Seo Man which is an honest and affectionate profile of Niall Toibin.

The festival is delighted to present the world premiere of BC/AD, the last work by the late artist Ian Breakwell in which he eloquently confronts his mortality.

The festival is internationally recognised as a leading showcase for the short film format and will screen several programme of shorts which will showcase local, national and international shorts. A highlight of the Outlook Programme is Mise Aerach which is a retrospective look at gay short filmmaking in Ireland. Filmmakers will also be given the opportunity to compete for several prestigious awards.

New additions to the programme include a special programme of New Arab Cinema and the screening of a diverse selection of award winning Mexican shorts. The Corona Cork Film Festival will also offer free special screenings for students in UCC and CIT.

Michael Barry of Barry & Fitzwilliam, distributors of Corona Extra said

'We are especially pleased to see that Mexican Short Films will be screened as part of the programme- a good fit for the Corona Extra brand which emanates from Mexico. It is also great to see the Festival showing film on campus at University College Cork and Cork Institute of Technology- this initiative will grow audiences and foster a greater appreciation of film and creativity in general'.

A further new element of the Festival programme are a series of screenings which are specifically designed to suit all the family and will include a performance by Canadian Super 8 Guru John Porter.

The Corona Cork Film Festival has unveiled the list of titles that will be screened in its three distinct short film programmes during this year’s event which runs from October 12 to 19. The festival is internationally recognized as a leading showcase for the short film format and attracts thousands of entries annually.

Submissions for the International Short Film competition have been whittled down to just 58 titles, featuring work from as far afield as Mexico, Israel, Egypt and New Zealand as well as a host of European shorts and a smattering of Irish directors to boot.

Meanwhile a total of 37 titles will battle it out in the Irish Short Film category, while in the Made in Cork programme dedicated to locally-produced cinema some 16 titles are in contention.

“The standard of submissions received from at home and abroad was as usual extremely high,” said festival director Mick Hannigan. “The festival programmers have had an unenviable task in trying to decide which films made the final cut, but we are confident that the chosen films will impress festival audiences as much as they have us.”

Additional shorts will be included in other festival programmes such as the Free Radicals experimental programme, the OutLook programme for lesbian and gay audiences and the Through The Looking Glass young people’s programme.

Detailed lists of all short films selected for competition are available on the festival website at www.corkfilmfest.org

The Corona Cork Film Festival announced today that Burn After Reading, the latest film from the Coen brothers, will open this year’s festival on October 12. The Corona Cork Film Festival will run for eight days and nights until October 19 and will screen an eclectic range of world cinema, documentaries, gala events and the short films for which the festival is famous.

Burn After Reading starring George Clooney and Brad Pitt is a comic caper about two unscrupulous gym employees who find themselves in the possession of a disk containing memoirs of a CIA agent. Seeing it as a way to make money fast, they attempt to sell it.

Mick Hannigan, Festival Director of the Corona Cork Film Festival said “Though different in tone to last year’s opening triumph, No Country For Old Men, we are confident that this latest film from the talented Coen Brothers will delight our audience”.

A further coup for the festival is the screening of Hunger, directed by Steve McQueen. Hunger, which won the Camera d’Or at the Cannes festival, tells the story of Bobby Sands, focusing on his final days of his hunger strike at the Maze Prison in 1981. McQueen’s portrait of Sand’s delivers a definitive and devastating account of political, violence and idealism. Co-writer Enda Walsh will attend the screening.

The festival will pay tribute to renowned British filmmaker Terence Davies with a full retrospective of his films. Davies will attend the Festival for the screening of his latest film Of Time And The City and will also take part in a public interview during the festival. The festival will also screen the world premiere of BC/AD the last work by the late artist, Ian Breakwell in which he eloquently confronts his mortality.

The full programme will be announced next week and tickets will be available for all screenings on www.corkfilmfest.org and from the Festival Box Office, Merchants Quay (Tel: 021 4272263) from October 4.

The Corona Cork Film Festival has unveiled the list of titles that will be screened in its three distinct short film programmes during this year’s event which runs from October 12 to 19. The festival is internationally recognized as a leading showcase for the short film format and attracts thousands of entries annually.

Submissions for the International Short Film competition have been whittled down to just 58 titles, featuring work from as far afield as Mexico, Israel, Egypt and New Zealand as well as a host of European shorts and a smattering of Irish directors to boot.

Meanwhile a total of 37 titles will battle it out in the Irish Short Film category, while in the Made in Cork programme dedicated to locally-produced cinema some 16 titles are in contention.

“The standard of submissions received from at home and abroad was as usual extremely high,” said festival director Mick Hannigan. “The festival programmers have had an unenviable task in trying to decide which films made the final cut, but we are confident that the chosen films will impress festival audiences as much as they have us.”

Additional shorts will be included in other festival programmes such as the Free Radicals experimental programme, the OutLook programme for lesbian and gay audiences and the Through The Looking Glass young people’s programme.

Detailed lists of all short films selected for competition are available on the festival website at www.corkfilmfest.org