The Dublin International Film Festival opened with
Jindabyne a film starring
Gabriel Byrne and the Dubliner was there in person to introduce the film and open the festival. On the way in I spotted actor
Patrick Bergin waiting in the lobby and although I'd be willing to bet there were a few other notable people in the crowd but he was the only other famous face I recognised.
The festival organisers made their obligatory thanks, then an attractive blonde spokeswoman from Jameson introduced the three winners of their short film competition, the top three can be seen on the
JamesonFilm website. Michael Dwyer introduced Gabriel Bryne and he gave short introduction to the film, and the difficulty of getting it made as with so many independant films, explaining how funding had been dropped on three seperate occasions before the film eventually went ahead.
The film is based on a short story by American author Raymond Carver called "so much water, so close to home". The story is a serious drama, dealing with a tragic death and the failing marriage of Stewart and Claire Kane played by Gabriel Byrne and Laura Linney. Mr. Bryne noted this was their third onscreen marriage, two of which were unhappy. Laura Linney was seen unhappily married in
The Squid and the Whale the
Surprise Film of the festival last year and it was noted that she had been a guest at the first Dublin International Film Festival. The story moves along at a leisurely pace setting up the characters and scene with care and attention. Stewart Kane and his friends go on a fishing trip only to find a dead body floating by the river. Shocked and stunned by the discovery they are at a loss as what should be done. They decide to leave the body in the water knowing it would deteriorate rapidly in the heat if they brought it ashore, and they use fishing line to tie down the body and prevent it from drifting away. Rather than head back report their find immediately they attempt to get back to normal and continue fishing as planned. On their return to town they receive little sympathy and are surprised by the harsh reaction they receive for not reporting the dead body immediately. The situation only adds to the strain already on Stewart and Claires marriage.
The story is dramatic and serious tragedy but with enough moments of light comendy not to be too oppressive. The acting is strong and subtle, the film has already having won several acting awards. After the film Gabriel Bryne was presented with a lifetime achievement award, the first of a new series of
awards called Voltas (in honour of the first Irish cinema) given out by the festival.
April films official website for
Jindabyne http://www.april.com.au/jindabyne/Wikipedia Page for the film
Jindabynehttp://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jindabyne_(film)http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0382765/maindetailsP.S. The quality of photographs taken by camera phones is poor enough to begin with so if any experts know how to prevent Nokia phones from down-scaling photo's before sending I would really like to disable this intentionally crippled functionality or learn of other ways to get better quality pictures out of a camera phone. If I can figure out some way to do this you can expect more pictures to go with my writings.
extatic