The graduate film showcase in Dún Laoghaire offers a cultural barometer - a snapshot of what the Irish film industry may feel like in a decade's time, writes Donald Clarke.
Once again, the Dún Laoghaire Institute of Art, Design and Technology's annual graduate film showcase offers us a cultural barometer, a snapshot of what the Irish film industry may feel like in a decade's time. This year's programme, which débuted in Dublin's Irish Film Centre last month, suggests that the coming generation of film-makers is disciplined, dedicated to narrative and reassuringly aware of tradition.
"It's a celebration of what we students have been up to over the past three years," says Richie Heffernan, director of the impressive documentary Where is My Brother? So he doesn't see the showcase as a means to lay one's wares before the film industry? "No. I think if it was that, it would have to be more strictly formalised."
Fellow director Diarmuid Goggins agrees: "It's great for your actors, to see your stuff up on the big screen ... Though the tutors and lecturers do say to you: be prepared to go out there and mingle." Goggins's and Heffernan's films represent the two genres which contain the best of this year's work: documentary and personal drama.
Where is My Brother? tells the story of the death of Heffernan's own brother from a methadone overdose. The interviews with his family are set against one another to subtly reveal the texture and weight of a secret grief. That one feels so uncomfortable watching it is to the film's credit.
In total contrast, we have Kate McCullough's excellent A Wee Wonder. Painting a portrait of an extravagantly-decorated public toilet in the Scottish Highlands, the documentary is littered with hilarious one-liners from the establishment's charming attendant, Willie Jack. My favourite sees him referring to one of the many awards he has received. "That's the highest you can go," he says, pausing for effect, "in toilets".
As for drama, Goggins's Nell brings us a conflict between two elderly women over the memory of a man whom they both loved. Though possessed of a strong story, the film's enigmatic structure and murmuring ambient soundtrack show a willingness to experiment, which is to be encouraged at this stage of a film-maker's career.
Vincent Lambe's Broken Things takes on a familiar theme, but succeeds thanks to a terrific central performance and a mature grasp of pacing. The extraordinary Diarmuid Noyes plays a young boy whose love of the piano offers escape from his parents' disintegrating marriage. Lambe shows a fine understanding of the importance of telling a story more through nuance than explicit declaration, of leaving chosen narrative threads hanging.
Thankfully, the unhinged extravagance one expects from film students is also on display. In the bizarre hostage drama The Puppet, director Ciaran Foy makes a good fist of conveying energy through fast cutting, something often attempted by whippersnapper directors, but rarely to such good effect. And Finbar Wilbrink's Tobias does something unusual with a priest, the bible, a big gun and four men in a bar. I have no idea what it's all about, but everyone looked as if they were having fun making it.
However, the overall impression is of a sober approach to the medium. Dwarves pouring yoghurt on each other's heads while reciting The Wasteland - so long a staple of film school graduation shows - are conspicuous by their absence. Happily, Peter Foott's Just a Little Bit of Love manages to combine the adventurous with the hilarious in equal measure. Already a hit at this year's Diversions festival in Temple Bar, this technically brilliant short finds a woman constructing herself a lover in the image of showband singer Des Smyth.
"A lot of stuff I do has to do with Frankenstein," Foott says. Though some fun is had with Smyth's jaunty tune, the director is keen to declare his affection for the showband era: "I collect old albums and found this Des Smyth LP in a second-hand shop. It had this song on it: Just a Little Bit of Love. It showed the huge amount of talent involved in that whole 1960s and 1970s Irish music scene."
Involving a series of complicated composite shots, Foott's film shows the collaborative nature of the college at its best. "Making the contacts is one of the most important things about the course," he says. "I got teamed up with a single crew, which I continued to use. From my experience there is no competition here. That's why the showcase is so important. It's a pat on the back for everyone."
The showcase features more work-in-progress from Foott - a trailer for an upcoming short named The Carpenter and His Clumsy Wife. If the finished product lives up to this tantalising snippet then the director's reputation, which is already significant, will continue to grow.
Mention should also be made of Dublin Institute of Technology's show reel, which features seven intriguing films by students from the college's Communications: Film and Broadcasting course.
Among them is Rob Burke's nifty comedy Moving Day, wherein two children get up to all kinds of creative high jinks in their war against the adult world. Burke shows an impressive grasp of mainstream cinematic techniques - pacy editing, tracking shots, ingenious camera angles - and the film has a finished quality which belies its limited budget.
More impressive again is the feat achieved by Ailish McElmeel in her interesting documentary Trading Spaces. Who would have thought one could ever give two hoots about the ashen-cheeked youths, punctured with outlandish ironmongery, who lurk outside The Temple Bar Music Centre each Saturday.
Yet not only does one listen with interest, but one actually begins to sympathise with the Kohl-eyed layabouts as they describe how they are being treated as an unsightly menace in an area of Dublin established to encourage diversity. Well done Ms McElmeel, you are the Goth's own Leni Riefenstahl.
