Irish Fantasy "The Legend of Longwood" Wins Second Prize at Giffoni Film Festival
The Legend of Longwood, a new Irish fantasy feature, has won second prize in its category at the 44th Giffoni Film Festival, Europe’s largest festival for children’s cinema.
The movie received second prize in the Element +10 category, which is aimed at films and shorts for audiences aged between 10 and 12.
Directed and co-written by Lisa Mulcahy, The Legend of Longwood stars newcomer Lucy Morton and Miriam Margoyles, best known to young audiences as Professor Sprout in the Harry Potter film series. The film stars Morton as Mickey Miller, a young American who must lift an ancient curse from a small Irish town and its people. Lucy encounters a world of supernatural and magic forces in this modern-day fairy tale.
The Legend of Longwood was filmed in Dublin and Wicklow and was produced by Grand Pictures. The project was financed by Bord Scannán na hÉireann/the Irish Film Board, the Dutch Film Fund, Premiere Pictures and the DFFF – German Federal Film Fund.
The 163 films from this year’s festival were chosen from 3,760 potential titles. The festival was founded in 1971 to develop and encourage cinema for young people, featuring a jury made up entirely of young people from over 50 different countries. This year’s festival was held from July 18th to 27th with the theme “Be Different”. The festival, now in its 44th year, was attended by Hollywood stars including Richard Gere, Alan Rickman and Lea Michele.