A Derry-born director and writer has taken a step closer to a possible Academy Award nomination after picking up a top award at the Foyle Festival.
Stephen Fingleton receiving the Best Irish Short Film award from Eavan King, competition manager, Foyle Film Festival.
Stephen Fingleton’s short film “SLR” picked up the Light in Motion (LIM) award for Best Irish Short Film at the festival’s closing ceremony in Brunswick Moviebowl.
The film tells the story of Elliott, played by Liam Cunningham, who is obsessed with “voyeur pornography” and after making a shocking discovery, follows the trail of an anonymous photographer known only by his online username Anorak.
Derry born Stephen (30), grew up in Fermanagh and is former pupil of St. Michael’s College and the former St. Michael’s Primary School in Enniskillen.
The film has an established cast, including some of Ireland’s leading actors. Liam Cunningham is well known for his roles in major Hollywood films and has appeared in Hunger and the BAFTA-winning short film, Pitch Black Heist. Richard Dormer recently played the lead of Terri Hooley in Good Vibrations, while both Liam and Richard star in Game of Thrones.
SLR’s lead actress Amy Wren stars on BBC One’s drama Silk and actor Ryan McParland is the lead of BBC Northern Ireland’s drama series Six Degrees. Jasmine Breingburg was the star of Danny Boyle’s Olympics opening ceremony.
Next year, Stephen will be shooting a film in Northern Ireland called The Survivalist, which has attracted interest from across the industry. It is being produced by Robert Jones, whose credits include The Usual Suspects and Gosford Park.
He is also writing a feature film to direct called Fog for the “Ridley Scott Presents” slate that is being executive produced by Ridley Scott for his company Scott Free. In addition he is writing a Film Noir for Working Titles Films and producer Tim Bevan, who are one of the UK’s biggest production companies and have made films such as Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, Atonement, Billy Elliot and Bridget Jones.
On completing his studies in Enniskillen, Stephen – who was selected by Screen Daily as a “Star of Tomorrow” earlier this year – went to University College London, where he studied English.
This year’s Light in Motion winners also included director Anthony Powell for his documentary, Antarctica: A Year on Ice; while the Irish Animation award went to Eoin Duffy for The Missing Scarf, an entertaining take on the existentialist crisis facing a posse of very cute woodland animals.
Robert Grieves was preented with the Best International animation award for Sausage, a funny tale of turf wars in an artisan food market and Talkon Hamzavi won the Best Short film for Parvaneh, the beautifully executed tale of an unlikely friendship between an Afghan immigrant and a punk.
The awards ceremony brought to a close five days and nights of screenings and workshops.
Tags:
