The Breton event has included Irish productions in its competition, until now reserved for British cinema. They made their mark on the charts.
From our journalist in Dinard,
Launched in 1990, the Dinard film festival has until now celebrated British cinema. But for its 35th edition which began on Wednesday, the Breton event has broadened its horizons and renamed itself the British and Irish Film Festival. This new name reflects the rise in power of the seventh art on the Emerald Isle in recent years. This dynamism was also seen in the prize list, awarded this Saturday. Irish productions won the prestigious Hitchcock Gold for best film and best performance.
Arielle Dombasle’s jury awarded its Golden Hitchcock to the directorial debut of Franco-Greek actress Ariane Labed, September Says. Behind closed doors features two close teenage sisters, who after being harassed at school, find refuge in the house of their Irish grandparents. Their complicity sets in motion strange games and challenges, sometimes dangerous. The balance between the timid July and the reckless September is undermined by mourning and the first emotions. The jury welcomed a powerful reflection on affection, love, devotion and what this can also lead to in terms of dysfunctional relationships of domination.
The trophy for best performance crowns Irish actor Lalor Roddy, 70 years old. The veteran, originally from Belfast, also seen in Hunger by Steve McQueen, portrays a boorish farm worker pulling the devil by the tail in the bucolic chronicle That They May Face the Rising Sun taking place in a village in Ireland in the 1980s in which a writer, former child of the country, settles (Barry Ward, Jimmy Hall) and his artist wife. Coming from London, they are the object of the curiosity and sometimes the distrust of the inhabitants, not always kind to intruders and city dwellers.
A prize from the jury and the public in unison
The jury and audience prize went in unison to the British romantic drama Unicorns, which tells the romance between a mechanic and a drag queen. Co-director James Krishna Floyd, who has been carrying out the project for ten years, and his actor Jason Patel did not hide their emotions as English independent cinema lacks resources and support. By comparison, on the Irish side, the audiovisual promotion agency Screen Ireland has a budget of 40 million euros and can support around fifteen films per year. James Krishna Floyd and Jason Patel appealed to French distributors in the Palais des arts room to Unicorns sort on the hexagonal screens.
That They May Face the Rising Sun, one of the biggest hits at the Irish box office of 2024, does not currently have a hexagonal distributor either. Just like Paul and Paulette Take a Bath by Franco-British Jethro Massey, winner of the Ouest-France Talent of Tomorrow prize. Presented in Cannes in the Un certain regard section, September Says should be released in France in the first half of 2025.
The artistic director of the Dinard Festival Dominique Green told the Figaro that the six films in competition this year, three British, three Irish, notably with Barry Keoghan (Bring Them Down), Tim Roth (Poison) ou Guy Prearce (The Convert) zn headliners, relied on very strong interpretations delicate to decide between. The jurors agreed on Saturday, noting that the deliberations had been very lively. The prize for best short film went to Legacy the Harry Hadden Paton.
