The reels of Limerick

THE final addition to the programme of Limerick's second Irish Film Festival will be the premiere of the first completed feature to emerge from Roger Corman's Connemara studio, Concorde Anois. The film, Bloodfist VIII: Trained to Kill, a martial arts tale starring Don The Dragon Wilson, will be screened at midnight tomorrow at the Savoy cinema in Limerick.

The festival opens in the Savoy tonight at 8 p.m. with Martin Duffy's The Boy From Mercury, which features Hugh O'Conor, Rita Tushingham, Tom Courtenay and eight year old newcomer James Hickey, and was well received on the closing night of the Dublin festival last month. It will be followed by midnight screenings of The Snapper and Interview With a Vampire.

In addition to the Corman movie, the feature films in tomorrow's schedule include Mise Eire, December Bride, Circle of Friends, The Crying Game, The Commitments, and, as part of the Cathal Black retrospective, Korea. The first of tomorrow's festival seminars, Independent in Mind (11 a.m., Belltable Arts Centre) will focus on Irish documentaries, with screenings of Mother Ireland, Dear Daughter, Women in Mountjoy, Famine and Make Rape, and many of the films will be represented by their directors in the subsequent discussion.

This will be followed at 4 p.m. by Rock on Film, a seminar on music video, and at 7.15 p.m. the Belltable will screen a programme of 12 Irish short films, including Damien O'Donnell's unmissable, multiple award winner, Thirty Five Aside. Sunday's Belltable schedule begins at 10.30 a.m., with a selection of short films on video, followed at 3 p.m. by a panel discussion on the theme, Irish Film - The Virtual Reality, and at 6.30 p.m. by screenings of Brian O'Flaherty's documentary, The Hunt Collection; a selection of work from Limerick film maker Eamon O'Connor; four short films from the Limerick and Kilmallock film archives; and completing the Cathal Black retrospective, Wheels, Our Boys, and Pigs.

The line up for Sunday at the Savoy includes The Playboys, All Things Bright and Beautiful, Hush a Bye Baby, Guiltrip, The Courier and the closing film, Frankie Starlight.