As part of our celebration of 40 years in operation, Garter Lane Arts Centre is thrilled to announce a gala screening of Poitín, Director/Producer Bob Quinn. The script for Poitín won the first ever Arts Council Script Award in 1976.
A 7pm Irish Poitín reception and speeches (kindly sponsored by Blackwater Distillery) will acknowledge the importance of film programming in the history of the arts centre, and will culminate with the screening of Poitín.
Bob Quinn’s firebrand response to pastoral visions of rural Ireland, this grim depiction of rural living generated outrage when it first appeared in 1979. The story concerns two layabouts, Labhrás (Donal McCann) and Sleamhnan(Niall Tóibín), and the poitín-brewer Micíl (Cyril Cusack) they work for. Against a stony, desolate background the pair distribute Micíl’s produce, struggling to avoid the attentions of the police as they do so. A piece of chance gives the pair the opportunity to steal Micíl’s poitín and sell it as their own; the success of this scheme turns the callous animosity between employees and employers into a more dangerous conflict. Images of stupidity and cruelty dominate this defiantly unsentimental film that, even today, retains its power to act as a riposte to idealisations of Ireland
Poitín features the late Cyril Cusack and Donal McCann, together with Niall Tóibín and the people of Conamara. The film negative went missing for years until cinematographer Seamus Deasy uncovered it in the vaults of Technicolor. The Irish Film Board instantly grasped the importance of this film and made possible the delicate remastering and redubbing processes which have been superbly accomplished by Framestore-CFC in London and Windmill Lane in Dublin.
Based on a story by Colm Bairéad it tells of an elderly poitín (moonshine) maker and his daughter who exact an appropriate revenge on the two agents who cheat and then terrorise them. Some of the local actors, Mairéad Ní Conghaile, Tom Sailí Ó Flatharta, Mick Lally, MacDara Ó Fatharta and Johnny Cóil Mhaidhc surprised even the above stars with the authentic resonance they added to the film. These went on to become stars of Irish radio & television.
It was cinematographer Seamus Deasy’s first dramatic film and was originally shot in 1977 on 16mm film. This limited its showings to film festivals and television, on which it is still occasionally broadcast (as recently as Christmas on TG4 where its audience exceeded that of any other film during that season). Its only theatrical showings were in Players Theatre, Dublin and Taibhdhearc na Gaillimhe where it ran to packed houses throughout the summer weekends of 1978. However it has been viewed all over the globe on television. The new 35mm version has been commissioned by Bord Scannán na h-Éireann and had its premiere at the Galway Film Fleadh, July 12th 2007.
It has begun its new life on DVD and on the Festival Circuit eg. Corner House, Manchester and Kerry International Film Festival.
