An upsurge in film production in Ireland is under way. As many as 18 projects are awaiting certification from the Department of Arts and Heritage.
All of these productions have applied to make use of the tax incentive scheme in Section 481 of the Finance Act.
"This is certainly an increase on the past two years," Mr Roger Greene, chief executive of the Screen Commission of Ireland, told The Irish Times at the Cannes Film Festival.
"We had a down period when Section 481 was renewed only for one year, which made American investors nervous. Now that it has been renewed for five years and we made that known since we visited the American Film Market in Los Angeles earlier this year, interest is up by over 100 per cent."
Among the current productions which have benefited from the tax incentive scheme are John Boorman's The Tailor of Panama, starring Pierce Brosnan,; David Caffrey's On the Nose, with Dan Aykroyd,; the 19-film project based on Samuel Beckett's stage plays; and the BBC-funded drama series, Rebel Heart.
Among the projects planned for the summer are the $40 million Spyglass production, The Count of Monte Cristo, which starts shooting in mid-July; Annette Carducci's Not Afraid, Not Afraid, starring Dianne Weist; and Yesterday's Children, to be directed by Manus Cole.
Producer Tristan Orpen Lynch of Subotica Films will follow On the Nose with a second Irish-Canadian co-production, Random Passage, an eight-hour TV series dealing with Irish settlers in Newfoundland, which starts shooting in Canada next week and moves to Ireland in July for six weeks' filming, mainly in Waterford. The Irish playwright and filmmaker Conor McPherson is set to follow his first film, Saltwater, with an as-yet-untitled feature in the summer, which will be financed by the Hollywood studio DreamWorks, with Neil Jordan as co-producer.
The veteran Hollywood director Herbert Ross will shoot a remake of the Orson Welles classic The Magnificent Ambersons in Ireland from July 17th.
Planned indigenous productions include Johnny Gogan's A Little Piece of Earth, produced by Paul Donovan; Shimmy Marcus's Headrush, produced by Edwina Forkin; and Paddy Breathnach's The Chosen Few, produced by Robert Walpole.
"Section 481 and the current exchange rate have created a great deal of interest," said Mr Greene, who has been running the screen commission since it opened in September 1998.
He had just come from a meeting in Cannes yesterday evening with Faye Dunaway, who is planning to produce and direct a film about Maria Callas, which she is considering making in Ireland next spring.
"Of course, you cannot base a film industry on the exchange rate," Mr Greene said. "However, the present stability of the tax incentive will benefit the Irish industry in the long term."