Irish Films Impress both Critics and Buyers at the Sundance International Film Festival
It has been a successful year for Irish film at the Sundance Film Festival which is taking place this week. The comedy feature THE GUARD starring Brendan Gleeson and the powerful documentary KNUCKLE have wooed critics and buyers alike with both receiving critical acclaim and making substantial international sales.
After four days of negotiations and a bidding war, Sony Picture Classics has closed a major deal for US and Latin American rights to John Michael McDonagh's THE GUARD after the film received rave reviews from pundits following its world premiere at the festival. The film has now sold to almost every territory in the world. Securing a large US sale to such a major distributor has been the final coup for the film, which will be seen by international audiences throughout 2011.
THE GUARD is a thriller-comedy set on the west coast of Ireland where Sergeant Gerry Boyle (Gleeson) is a small-town cop with a confrontational personality, a subversive sense of humour, a dying mother, a fondness for prostitutes, and absolutely no interest whatsoever in the international cocaine-smuggling ring that has brought FBI agent Wendell Everett (Cheadle)to his door.
Revolver Entertainment snapped up the Irish and U.K. rights for Ian Palmer's documentary KNUCKLE while ContentFilm International bought all foreign rights (excluding the UK) and will sell the documentary at the European Film Market at the Berlinale next month. The film should now see a UK/Irish cinema release later this year.
The film which follows an epic 12-year journey into the world of an Irish traveller community and their brutal bare-knuckle fighting lives has been the talk of the festival, particularly with industry players vying for remake rights. On Monday, HBO neared a deal which would see Rough House Pictures and the documentary's producers Rise Films remake KNUCKLE into a TV drama series for the popular US channel.
The Irish short film SMALL CHANGE directed by Cathy Brady and the Irish-Scottish co-production PERFECT SENSE are also screening all week.
Element Distribution will release The Guard in Irish cinemas later this year.
ABOUT KNUCKLE
KNUCKLE was produced by Teddy Leifer for Rise Films and Ian Palmer for Seafield with finance from the IFB and BBC Storyville. Screen Daily said that KNUCKLE was "Impressively and compulsively shot.... a fascinating glimpse into a world kept usually very private".
ABOUT THE GUARD
THE GUARD is a thriller-comedy set on the west coast of Ireland where Sergeant Gerry Boyle (Gleeson) is a small-town cop with a confrontational personality, a subversive sense of humour, a dying mother, a fondness for prostitutes, and absolutely no interest whatsoever in the international cocaine-smuggling ring that has brought FBI agent Wendell Everett (Cheadle)to his door. The film is an Irish/UK co-production, backed by the IFB and international financiers. It's produced by Chris Clark and Flora Fernandez Marengo for Reprisal Films and Ed Guiney (Garage) and Andrew Lowe (The Wind that Shakes the Barley) for Element Pictures.
THE GUARD directed by John Michael McDonagh and starring Brendan Gleeson has garnered critical acclaim at the festival. According to Variety"... it's Gleeson who rightly owns the screen as a beer-swilling, crotch-grabbing, Derringer-firing crusader with one hell of a filthy mouth to go along with his heart of gold." and the director John Michael McDonagh's "filmmaking crackles with energy".
ABOUT THE SUNDANCE FILM FESTIVAL
The Sundance Film Festival, which was originally founded by Robert Redford is the largest independent cinema festival in the U.S., with more than 50,000 people attending screenings in Park City, Utah.