Friday 6 July 2007

Czech Karlovy Vary A-List Film Festival's World Premiere of RTE Drama 'Damage' (2007) by 'Song for a Raggy Boy' (2003)'s Irish Director Aisling Walsh



Pictured above: Steaming geysers nourish the lush red rose hedges along the icy mountain river in the center of Karlovy Vary's castle-lined boulevards, where once a year Hollywood goes 'Bohemian' at the world's most fabulous A-List Film Fest.

And this year, it's party time for the Irish in Bohemia!

42nd Karlovy Vary International Film Festival

Irish Director Aisling Walsh's new film Damage (2007) has its World Premiere at the 42nd Karlovy Vary Film Fest in the Czech Republic, which is among the top ten A-List Film Fests around the globe each year.

The Karlovy Vary IFF is one of the oldest film festivals of all time (the first year took place in 1946). For more than 40 years the festival was organized under the pressure of the political situation in socialist Czechoslovakia.

Aisling Walsh entered the public stage with her short films (such as Hostage, which was shot while she was studying at the National Film School and which won her awards at the Chicago Film Festival and the Tours Film festival).

She successfully made her way in television (with the serial Trial and Retribution, (1997), the homosexual love story Forgive and Forget, (2000), the story of emancipated mothers in the 1960’s, Sinners, (2002), and the drama Fingersmith, (2005), nominated for the BAFTA award, among others).

The talented director found success off the small-screen with the movie Joyriders (1989) and in particular with the dramatic tale of the fortunes of an idealistic teacher in a boy’s reform school set in 1930s Ireland, Song for a Raggy Boy (2002), in which the lead role was played by Aidan Quinn, and which was screened in competition at Karlovy Vary in 2003.

Colour, 35 mm
Ireland, 2007, 95 min
WP – World premiere
Section: Horizons

Director: Aisling Walsh
Screenplay: Aisling Walsh
Dir. of Photography: Simon Kossoff
Music: Niall Byrne
Designer: John Hand
Editor: Stephen O’Connell
Producer: Tristan Lynch, Dominic Wright
Production: Subotica Entertainment Ltd.
Contact: Subotica Entertainment Ltd.

Cast: Nathalie Press, Olivia Williams, Brendan Coyle, David O’Hara

Irish Director Aisling Walsh Damage (2007) Trailer (download from KVFF site):



Damage (1 x 90 mins or 2 x 1 hour) - produced for RTE - is a tense and pacy drama directed by Aisling Walsh (BAFTA-nominated Fingersmith, Trial & Retribution) in which a family's seemingly perfect life is shattered when the daughter, Emma, is raped by a family friend at her 21st birthday party.

With the key suspect released on bail, and dark family secrets coming to the fore, Emma's life begins to freefall until a chance meeting with her rapist convinces her that she needs to go to court and confront him before she can move on with her life.

Synopsis:

The Cahills would pass for a normal, happy, and all around successful family. Emma continues in the lifestyle of her father Aidan and mother Michelle, and begins trying to make it as a model.

Hardly anyone suspects that the husband and wife live separate lives, the most important people in which are actually Aidan’s secretary and their family friend John Ward, the father of their daughter’s friend Laurel.

The outward image of the socially well-positioned family changes however when the Cahills hold a party to celebrate their daughter’s 21st birthday in their home in an elegant Dublin suburb, and Emma is raped.

The girl refuses to silently reconcile herself with her traumatic experience. What chance does she have against her antagonist and his lawyers?

How will she find a way to come to terms with what happened to her? And will her friends and family be capable of banding together to help her?

This psychological drama by director Aisling Walsh tells of the dark shadows cast on the private and public image of one successful family.

Written and directed by Aisling Walsh, "Damage" stars Nathalie Press, Olivia WIlliams, David O'Hara and Brendan Coyle. International Sales are through Minotaur.





Cardiff School of Creative & Cultural Industries

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