A casting agency is casting a drinks advert in Kenmare on Thursday 24th and Friday 25th of July. There may be call backs on Saturday 26th July TBC. The venue will is Brook Lane Hotel, Kenmare. The shoot dates are the August 19th and 20th, so please ensure you are free for those dates if go for the audition!!

Please call Gillian on 087 261 9718 to book audition times.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Everybody in the commercial must be over the age of 25 and must look like they are over the age of 25.

Background:
Set in rural Ireland the commercial is full of rustic, earthy, rugged values. The market for this commercial is central and eastern Europe, so there is no harm in playing on an idealised notion of Ireland. The characters that populate the commercial should be real. There should be an authenticity to them. Like in a traditional, rural Irish pub.

Types:
Old guys propping up the bar (every night in their usual seats), supping a pint and telling long tales.
Younger, rustic types who have made a conscious decision to step out of the urban rat race.
Middle-aged couples from both rural and civil service backgrounds who have lived in the area all their lives.
Young ones from the area who call in for the music, the craic and a bit of flirting.
Local musicians who love to come and play the odd session more for their own gratification than any reward that might be in it.
Local businessmen and their wives whom have made it good in their own area.

All in all a fairly mixed bag of personalities and characters who simply enjoy a night in the local having the craic! Although they may all be from different backgrounds, interests and age groups, they just seem to merge into one melting pot of authentic characters.

A wide range of new live action shorts will be presented at the Galway Film Fleadh produced under the Short Cuts and Short Shorts film schemes on Saturday 12th July.

New films produced under the Short Cuts scheme include THE DOOR (Juanita Wilson), LOWLAND FELL (Michael Kirinons), SPACEMEN THREE (Hugh O'Conor) and OF BEST INTENTIONS (Brian Durnin). The scheme aims to encourage strong, original storytelling, visual flair, and production values appropriate to the big screen.

The Door, written and directed by Juanita Wilson and produced by Louise Curran (Octagon Films) is based on the true story of a father and his young daughter set in Russia 1986. Juanita jointly produced the feature films H3 and Inside I'm Dancing. She has written the screenplay As If I Am Not There, an adaptation of the novel of the same name by Slavenka Drakulic which is due to film during 2009. The Door was shot by cinematographer Tim Fleming (Once, Small Engine Repair).

Blinder Films present Lowland Fell written and directed by Michael Kinirons. The film tells of a teenage girl who makes an extraordinary discovery on an isolated bog. Kinirons is a recent graduate of the National Film School in London and has previously directed a number of short films including an IFB Short Short (Treeclimber) as well as a series for TG4 (Blood and Ink). The short is produced by Katie Holly (Striapacha, Basket Case) and shot by cinematographer Suzie Lavelle (An Creatur, Treeclimber).

Spacemen Three directed by Hugh O'Conor and written by John Butler and Hugh O'Connor tells the story of an astro-geologist in space for the first time. O'Connor began his career in acting in 1985 opposite Liam Neeson in 'Lamb', and has appeared in such films as 'My Left Foot', winning the Youth In Film Award, The Young Poisoner's Handbook and Chocolat. The film is shot by cinematographer Cian de Buitlear whose credits include Man About Dog and South Paw.

Directed by Brian Drumm and produced by Paul Holmes of Red Rage Films Of Best Intentions is a film that examines the lives of five well-meaning individuals as fate decides to intervene. With a large number of commercials under his belt, Brian has written and directed a number of award winning short films including An Teanga Runda which was selected to screen at the Tribeca Film Festival and Tilly and the Teeth. Holmes previously produced the successful short film Screwback.

Short Cuts will premiere on July 12th at 3pm in the Town Hall Theatre at the Galway Film Fleadh.

For more information on these and other IFB funded shorts visits http://www.irishfilmboard.ie/ Or contact Louise Ryan, Marketing and Communications Executive, Bord Scannan na hEireann / the Irish Film Board, T) +353 91 561 398

Bord Scannan na hEireann/the Irish Film Board (IFB) has just announced that the first ten Virtual Cinema shorts are now live on its website. http://www.irishfilmboard.ie/film_directory/virtual_cinema/

The new scheme, co-ordinated by Wildwave, focused on producing high-quality Irish shorts suited to new forms of digital video consumption.

The shorts, which can now be viewed online, are:
- Don't Leave Me Hanging by Paddy Courtney & Simon Gibney
- Deer Park by Billy Walsh
- Paranoid Fat Chick Gets Fired by Cecilia McAllister
- When Nuns Attack by Boru
- A Facebook Fatwa by Eamonn Carey
- The Athenroydes by Jesse Ward & Sue Morrell
- Stay Out Of My Bag by Frances Roe
- Chipper by Rachael O'Kane
- The Perils Of Internet Dating by Simon Eustace
- Rapunzel - The Blonde Years by Trish Groves & Fiona Ashe

The Year is Near: 2009 Sundance Film Festival
Begin your preparations now for the 2009 Sundance Film Festival set to arrive in Park City, Utah from January 15-25, 2009. If you are a filmmaker planning on submitting your film to the Festival, the official deadline to submit is September 5th for short films and September 8th for feature films and documentaries. If you are a Festivalgoer, it's never too early to begin making travel arrangements and you can book travel now with local experts through Destination: Sundance Film Festival. Learn More

Stories of Change
The Sundance Institute Documentary Film Program, in partnership with the Skoll Foundation, will provide $1.2 million in grants to new, feature-length independent documentary films that frame, examine, and amplify social entrepreneurship as an innovative approach to the central questions of our time. Proposals are now being accepted and the deadline to submit is August 15, 2008. The third convening of the Sundance/Skoll Stories of Change partnership will take place during the Independent Producers Conference from July 31-August 3 at the Sundance Resort. Prior convenings included the 2008 Skoll World Forum in Oxford, England and the 2008 Sundance Film Festival where Albina Ruiz (pictured left) discussed waste reduction management in Peru. Learn More

Native Initiative News
On July 10, 2008, the Walker Art Center in conjunction with Sundance Institute will celebrate Native American filmmaking with free screenings of two Sundance Film Festival award-winning films. Sikumi (On the Ice), pictured left, a short film directed by Andrew Okpeaha MacLean and Four Sheets to the Wind, a full-length film directed by Sterlin Harjo will be followed by a Q&A with the films' directors and moderated by Bird Runningwater, Associate Director of Sundance Institute's Native American and Indigenous Initiative. There will also be a community screening of these films on July 9 on the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe Reservation in Onamia, Minnesota. Read More

Summer on the Mountain
The Sundance summer Lab season is underway in the mountains of Utah. During June, the Sundance Resort hosted the Directors and Screenwriters Lab and the Documentary Edit and Story Lab. The Directors Lab, a core element of the Feature Film Program, provides an opportunity for filmmakers to develop distinctive new work under the guidance of accomplished Creative Advisors. Creative Advisors ranged from directors to actors to cinematographers, including Robert Elswit, winner of a 2008 Academy Award for Best Cinematography for There Will Be Blood. The Insider sat down with Elswit to discuss the creative spark thriving at the Labs and what light brings to a film. Click below to read this interview. Read More

2008 Documentary Edit and Story Lab
Sundance Institute selected eight Fellows for the sixth annual Lab which focuses on the craft of editing in documentary filmmaking. The projects this year represent stories from around the world, including Natalia Almada's El General, a historical reflection on one of Mexico's most controversial presidents from the perspective of the president's great granddaughter. Pictured left, editor Vivien Hillgrove and director Deann Borshay Liem work on Precious Objects of Desire, a story about mistaken identity in a South Korean adoption process. To catch a first-hand take on the Sundance Lab experience, participants have been blogging for Filmmaker Magazine. Read More Read Blog

Now Playing
Mark and Jay Duplass's Baghead, Susan Koch's Kicking It (pictured left), and Yung Chang's Up the Yangtze are a sampling of comedies and documentaries from the 2008 Sundance Film Festival now playing in theatres across the country. The Sundance-supported play written by singer/songwriter Stew Passing Strange continues to play on Broadway and Tanya Barfield's Of Equal Measure (Theatre Lab 2006) continues its run at the Kirk Douglas Theatre in Culver City, CA. Read More

From the Archives

The LA FEMME FILM FESTIVAL, which showcases the work of emerging and professional women filmmakers in Beverly Hills, California is looking for entries from up and coming young female film directors.