Irish Talent Spotlight 2011 - Juanita Wilson, David O’Reilly & Aidan Gillen
Each year Bord Scannán na hÉireann/the Irish Film Board (IFB) and the Jameson Dublin International Film Festival present the Irish Talent Spotlight. This initiative is designed to profile and foster exceptional new and established talent working in all areas of the Irish film industry.
This year the Irish Talent Spotlight will be on director Juanita Wilson, animator David O'Reilly and actor Aidan Gillen.
JUANITA WILSON
Born and reared in Dublin, Juanita Wilson studied at NCAD, UCD and DIT. Before she started directing, Juanita jointly developed and produced two powerful, award-winning feature films: H3 written by surviving Irish hunger striker Laurence McKeown about his experience and Inside I'm Dancing about the quest for independent living by two Dublin men with disabilities.
Her first film The Door was nominated for an Oscar in 2009. Stellan Skarsgård awarded Juanita the prestigious Katrin Cartlidge foundation bursary at the Sarajevo Film Festival which recognises "a new creative voice in cinema, showing the independence, singularity and integrity of spirit that the actress exemplified in her own lifetime." The film continues to travel to festivals throughout the world.
Juanita has just followed The Door with an equally hard hitting true story from the Bosnian war, As If I Am Not There, based on Croatian journalist slavenka Drakulic's book of the same name. The film, shot in Sarajevo, Macedonia and Sweden, premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in September, receiving an incredible response from both audiences and critics alike. The film has just gone on to win the prestigious Silver Pyramid at the Cairo International Film Festival and it picked up the Best Film, Best Director and Best Script accolades at the Irish Film and Television Awards this month.
Juanita has just optioned the Daniel Woodrell (Winter's Bone) novel, The Ones You Do, a book described by L.A. Confidential's James Ellroy as ‘'stone brilliant'' and filming is expected to begin during spring 2012.
Click here to book tickets for As If I Am Not There
DAVID O'REILLY
"Subversive animated genius.... whose style lies somewhere between Kubrick and Kaufman and Ketamine."
Xeni Jardin / BoingBoing
"O'Reilly is one of the most promising young animators on the contemporary animation scene... what continues to impress me about O'Reilly's work are his efforts towards finding a true and honest graphic expression befitting the CG medium instead of trying to force traditional graphic concepts to fit a CG mold as most everybody else does."
Amid Amidi / Cartoon Brew
David O'Reilly is an Irish animator, who is based in Berlin, that has, from an inauspicious beginning in Kilkenny, where he was born in 1985, become something of a phenomenon. At 15 years of age a love of drawing led him to an internship at a local animation studio where he learned the ropes and excelled, teaching himself 3D software in his spare time, all under the watchful eyes of mentors recently Oscar nominated animator Tomm Moore and Aidan Harte. He discovered cinema in 2005, when he was given the keys to an unused private theatre with an enormous film library and since then has created a wide variety of independent short films.
O'Reilly's work is at the centre of a vortex of publicity and awards. His animation is lauded world over and he is noted for his disregard of conventions, while his work is regarded as amongst the most ground-breaking in contemporary 3D animation. His output as director has included The External World (2010), Please Say Something (2009), Octocat Adventure (2008), Serial Entoptics (2008), RGBXYZ (2008) and Wofl 2106 (2006). The External World picked up the Best Animation Award at the Irish Film and Television Awards earlier this month.
Click here to book tickets for The External World
AIDAN GILLEN
Aidan Gillen is an outstanding screen and stage actor who is perhaps best known for his role as Tommy Carcetti in HBO's and David Simon's brilliant television series The Wire. In Ireland and the UK he is also famous for his role as stuart Alan Jones in the ground-breaking British television series, Queer as Folk and its sequel, Queer as Folk 2, for which he was nominated for a BAFTA for best Actor in 2000.
Aidan recently completed Treacle Jr. which sees him re-teaming with director Jamie Thraves for the first time since The Low Down which saw him win the Best Newcomer Award at the Edinburgh Film Festival in 2000.
Aidan also stars in Wake Wood a contemporary horror film from legendary hammer films. Aidan earned a best Actor nomination at the BAFTAs for his role in the BBC movie Safe. He played the evil Lord Nelson Rathbone in the Hollywood movie Shanghai Knights opposite Jackie Chan and Owen Wilson.
Amongst his theatre credits are a Tony Award nomination for his highly acclaimed Broadway role in Harold Pinter's The Caretaker in 2003 and an Irish Times Theatre Award nomination for his portrayal of teach in the 2007 Dublin Gate Theatre's production of David Mamet's American Buffalo. Other notable theatre credits include Jez Butterworth's original production of Mojo where he played the role of Skinny to great acclaim. Also Ariel in The Tempest and Platonov in Platonov, both at the Almeida. He most recently played Richard Roma in David Mamet's Glengarry Glen Ross at the Apollo theatre in the west end in 2007.
Whether on stage or on screen, Gillen oozes charisma and breathes life in all his characters. He is, without doubt, one of the most respected, daring and challenging Irish actors working today.
Click here to book tickets for Wake Wood
Click here to book tickets for Treacle Jr.