Sign up to The Irish Times Archive (1859 - 2008)My Account »

As this year’s festival draws to a close with accolades, awards and surprise screenings, DONALD CLARKEreflects on a fortnight of film – characterised by increased visibility for women film-makers

Kavanagh’s most recent feature, the domestic drama Our Wonderful Home, brimmed with potential, but was somewhat let down by a taste for chewy melodrama. The new film is something else altogether. Inclining towards bleaker Ingmar Bergman tragedies such as Cries and Whispers, The Fading Lightconcerns the death of a mother from a harrowing disease. Two daughters prowl the house remembering childhood traumas while their brother, who suffers from severe learning difficulties, keens mournfully in the corridor. A nurse talks the sick woman through various unappealing palliative measures. The film is jaw-droppingly brave in its refusal to admit any sentimental platitudes and in its determination to look suffering sternly in the face. You are left drained by the experience — is there, maybe, one too many catastrophes? — but eager to see where this gifted film-maker will go from here.