IFI Irish Film Archive

The Colleen Bawn

Year1911 Duration41m 44s ProducerThe Kalem Film Company of America

The Colleen Bawn is an ambitious story which evolves from a simple rural tale to a complex narrative of social status, love, murder and deception. The film is inspired by the true events of the 1819 murder of 15 year-old Ellen Scanlan in Co. Clare, and based on the 1860 play of the same name by Dion Boucicoult. On the brink of financial disaster, Mrs Cregan hatches a plan to regain her social status and wealth through an arranged marriage of her son, Hardress. His heart longs for a poor farmer’s daughter (The Colleen Bawn) and they decide to marry in secret. However, realising the impact this marriage has on his family’s fortune, he plans to free himself from this union by having his bride killed. The film uses the beautiful rural locations of Co. Kerry to great advantage.

Our second IFI Filmmaker Playlist is curated by filmmaker and visual artist Trish McAdam. Since the production of her early shorts in the 1980s, Trish has created a vibrant and varied body of work, embracing a range of forms and subjects and retaining a singular, independent voice. We're delighted to welcome Trish to the Irish Film Institute to select her top picks from films preserved in the IFI Irish Film Archive and presented on the IFI Archive Player. Only one reel of this three-reel film has survived the ravages of time and so the tale is incomplete – but worth watching nonetheless. In this transatlantic tale, feisty young Peggy O’Malley (Gene Gauntier) refuses her father's orders to marry Jerry, the village blacksmith and runs away to New York City via steam-liner. Upon landing in New York she gets a job working as a parlour maid in the home of wealthy Mrs Mortimer. The film includes striking documentary-like elements in scenes set in Ireland – at the cattle market in Killarney and scenes of the emigrant ship leaving Queenstown (now Cobh) for America. This is all that survives of the film. Contemporaneous reviews fill in the remaining story : It’s not long before Peggy falls into a bad crowd and soon finds herself arrested for a crime she didn’t commit. With the news of Peggy’s arrest having made its way back home, will her blacksmith in shining armour come to save her from her wrongful imprisonment and take her back to Ireland? A single reel of this 3 reel film was discovered in the Museum of Modern Art following research by IFI in preparation for a major retrospective of Irish cinema in MOMA in 2011.

20m 00s

Essie's Last Stand

It’s Dublin, 1999, and 76 year old Essie Keeling, Georgie her dog and her neighbour Karl Byrne are fighting eviction by property developers and homelessness. This timely, inspiring story of determination and resistance offers a crucial lens through which to view Dublin’s current housing crisis. Despite her age and ill health, the lovable Essie is a force to be reckoned with. She refuses an offer of one thousand pounds when asked to make way for the demolition and redevelopment of her home into luxury apartments. Gathering a mass of supporters, including Richard Boyd Barrett and Nell McCafferty, Essie and Karl make a stand that captures the public’s imagination and wins the heart of the audience. Don’t miss our exclusive clip below, where Loopline revisit Essie one year later. Director Liam McGrath has documented Irish society for over twenty years with a regular focus on Traveller Culture. He is known for the feature documentary Southpaw: The Francis Barrett Story (1998) and was winner of the 2015 Best Director Television IFTA for Dolores Keane: A Storm in the Heart.

15m 49s

Specimens - The Roy Spence Collection

Considered to be one of the most ambitious films made by the Spence Brothers, this stone-age alien extravaganza has everything a true sci-fi fan needs in spades. The mission is simple: aliens must capture and record living specimens from earth. However a violent earthquake forces the ship to take off whilst a giant robot, used to collect specimens, is swallowed up in the eruption. During quarry excavations in the present day the robot is re-animated, and the mission is still on. Roy Spence is an award-winning amateur filmmaker. For the past 50 years, Spence has been making and screening a series of remarkable and sometimes eccentric films in his cinema in Comber, Co. Down. The films span many genres from sci-fi to horror to folk-life documentaries shot between 1965 and 1986. His collection of over 40 films (13 documentaries/non-fiction and 29 fiction feature films) is held and preserved in the IFI Irish Film Archive.

7m 04s

Republican Loans

In 1919, on the block where Robert Emmet was executed, Michael Collins read a letter from Michael Fogarty, Bishop of Killaloe, pledging financial support to the new self-declared Irish Republic. Filmed at St. Enda’s College in Rathfarnham, (the school founded by Patrick Pearse in 1908), this remarkable film shows Michael Collins, the Irish Government’s Minister for Finance, inviting various prominent Republicans to purchase bonds to help finance the new Republic. Bonds are purchased by 30 named figures, Republicans and survivors of executed 1916 leaders. They include: Arthur Griffith; Eoin MacNeill; Erskine Childers; William Cosgrave; the widows of Eamonn Ceannt, Tom Clarke, the O Rahilly, Joseph Plunkett, and the mother and sister of Patrick Pearse. The film was made during an interlude in the making of Willy Reilly and his Colleen Bawn, a feature- length drama directed by John MacDonagh, which was released the following year. The film played an instrumental role in the success of the Republican Loans campaign. Director John MacDonagh, brother of the executed 1916 leader Thomas MacDonagh (a teacher in St Enda’s) , once said, “in those dangerous and exciting times, no cinema owner would dare risk exhibiting the Republican Loans film so it was planned for a few volunteers in fast cars to visit certain cinemas, rush the operator’s box, and, at gun-point, force the operator to take off the film he was showing, and put on the Loan film”.

9m 04s

Up the Canal

This short film explores how the Grand Canal in Dublin has changed over the years. The voiceover provided by Irish novelist, short story writer and humourist John D. Sheridan, notes how methods of transport have changed and how fewer boats and barges now use the waterway. The aural memories are illustrated by poetic footage of the canal in the 1960s. The director, Margaret Currivan, won first prize for Up the Canal in the 'Film Shows Cup’ at the 1961 Dublin Amateur Cine Society competition (a competition predominantly entered by male filmmakers at the time). Margaret Currivan (b. 1923) was an avid amateur filmmaker, most prolific from 1954 to 1966. Currivan had a keen interest in photography and co-owned Currivan's Photographic Services in Dublin with her husband, Patrick Joseph (PJ). The shop processed and sold film, projectors, cameras and equipment and the filmmaker would, therefore, have had access to equipment, supplies and quick processing. Her films chronicle the story of her family, PJ and children Helen, Dan, and Paddy, engaged in key events including birthdays, Christmases and holidays. Currivan sometimes appears in her films, alluding to partial recording made by PJ. However, the shots are few and authorship is retained by Currivan who is noted to have also meticulously edited her films using a manual reel-to-reel device and splicer.

4m 00s

The White Dress

An enigmatic tale of a young girl determined to participate in the ritual of First Holy Communion, even if she has to go it alone. A young girl wakes up in a grim flat, washes herself and dons a white dress, shoes and handbag. She completes her outfit with white ribbons stolen from a shop as she makes her way to the church, alone. Surrounded by other happy communicants and their families, she bravely participates in the ceremony and happily accepts a five euro note from a man in the church grounds. With great economy, Vanessa Gildea constructs a complex narrative reflecting upon child neglect; poverty; the power of long-held traditions of the Catholic Church and the determination of a young girl to be accepted by the community in the face of great odds. This film is part of F-Rated: Short Films by Irish Women.