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JUST WHEN YOU thought it was safe to return to your local cinema, a new generation of Irish filmmakers are hoping to scare you out of your seats with their own unique spins on the horror genre.
A bevy of young talent is on show at this year’s Virgin Media Dublin International Film Festival (VMDIFF), which runs from 23 February to 6 March.
Perhaps the most arresting outing of the bunch is director Rioghnach Ní Ghrioghair stunning short Don’t Go Where I Can’t Find You.
If every love story is a ghost story, as the quote goes, then the inverse is also true.
At the centre of the film is a love triangle between three women — one living, one dead and one somewhere between the two, struggling to deal with a loss.
Margaret (Marie Ruane), a composer, is haunted by grief over the violent death of her partner Freya (Stephanie Dufresne) and guilt over the truth of her relationship with her lead violinist, Louise.
She picks up her pen and baton again and sets about writing a suite of music she hopes will prove redemptive.
But conducting and recording the piece in an old, sumptuously-decorated but fundamentally creepy stately home — the very house where tragedy struck, naturally — proves fraught with terror and emotion.
A presence begins to reveal itself through the sounds of the house, the music and the recording process, sending Margaret down a rabbit hole of psychological torment.
Combining ASMR sound techniques with the dissonance and shrieking violins of the film’s score — composed by Garret Sholdice and Benedict Schlepper Connolly of the Dublin label and music company Ergodos — the film’s sound design by Garrett Farrelly is worth the price of admission alone.
“The music was a central element,” Ní Ghrioghair tells The Journal.
One of the big jumping-off points for her, she says, was Andrew Dominick’s Nick Cave documentary, One More Time with Feeling.
Filmed following the tragic death of Cave’s teenage son, the film captures the artist during the final sessions for his spare, haunted 2016 studio album Skeleton Key.
“There was something really haunting about the recording of that album — grief being sort of palpable in the air without being discussed,” Ní Ghrioghair explains.
“So I kind of developed this ghost story that was heavily influenced by my love of music and films that are about musicians and tortured musicians.”
Don’t Go Where I Can’t Find also wears its more obvious visual influences on its sleeves like Dario Argento’s 1977 art-horror classic Suspiria and its 2018 remake by Luca Guadagnino.
Filmed at Orlagh House near the Hellfire Club in Rathfarnham, Co Dublin, the setting provides a lush and colourful but unsettling backdrop for the melodrama as it unfolds.
“The house itself had all this fantastic wallpaper, which is something horror directors really love,” Ní Ghrioghair says, wryly.
“The location definitely influenced our shot list and our approach to shooting it, even the geography of it and where certain things happened. We let the house kind of become a character itself.”
The result is an eery, full-body experience of a film that hints at more great things to come for its director Ní Ghrioghair, who soon hopes to delve deeper into the horror genre with a feature-length outing.
“Don’t Go Where I Can’t Find is complementary of a feature that I am trying to get out,” she says.
“They’re both very tactile, hyper-sensory, highly emotional, horror-leaning films. I think this is complementary and demonstrates what I can do with the feature idea I have.”
A Dublin vampire story
Navigating completely alien waters from Ní Ghrioghair’s emotional short is director Conor McMahon’s comedy-horror Let the Wrong One In.
A Dublin vampire story, the feature film tells the story of Dublin supermarket worker Matt (Karl Rice), whose estranged, hard-living brother Deco (Eoin Duffy) suddenly makes a reappearance.
Their relationship had already been strained beyond breaking point by Deco’s narcissism, his addictions and his lifestyle generally.
But now, Deco is dealing with an additional complication: he’s just been turned into a vampire and he has no one else to ask for help.
Enter a trainspotting vampire hunter played by Buffy the Vampire Slayer cult hero Anthony Head, who uses his day job as a Dublin taxi driver to hunt down and execute the growing population of blood-suckers spreading throughout the capital.
Shlocky, funny and self-consciously daft (think The Young Offenders meets The Lost Boys) McMahon says Let the Wrong One In was his attempt to put a quintessentially Irish spin on the age-old vampire trope.
Vampirism has been used as an artistic metaphor for addiction for decades, he says.
“Obviously it’s there in the film but the character I was really looking at was Matt and the question of how do you deal, not necessarily just with people who are addicted, but also narcissistic people, who are just very selfish,” McMahon explains.
Matt kind of figures out halfway through that he’s actually enabling this behaviour. He’s sort of running around trying to help.And that’s the sort of that realisation — which is a realisation that I had in my own life — that I don’t have to match my behaviour to what they’re asking.
Let the Wrong One In also shows just how fresh contemporary Dublin can look and feel when the camera is in the right hands — in this case, cinematographer Michael Lavelle’s.
Probably better known as a filming location for period pieces, the modern city and its suburbs jumps off the screen at points in McMahon’s film, thanks, not least, to a handful of eye-catching drone shots.
McMahon, a Dubliner himself, admits that even he is guilty of not fully realising Dublin’s potential as a backdrop in his films and also as a subject.
“Part of that, I think, is just the choice of films I’ve made,” he explains.
“Sometimes, because I’m in horror, it makes more sense to be down the countryside somewhere in some farmhouse or an isolated location. But actually, I very specifically wanted to make a film in Dublin.
” I always feel — especially when you’re writing a script — you need that feel for the local dialogue. So when I was writing this in Dublin, you suddenly realise you’re absorbing your whole environment: you might be walking into town or on a bus.”
“Suddenly, your everyday life gets filtered into the script,” McMahon says.
Visually, he found Dublin to be an equally rich environment, he adds.
“You could point the camera, and just whatever was in the frame would tell a particular story,” McMahon says.
“Maybe again, just because I’m from Dublin, I recognise that more easily just with the framing of shots. Like I kind of knew what I was looking for.”
Also on show at this year’s VMDIFF is Kate Dolan’s slow-burning, Dublin-set folk horror You Are Not My Mother.
Shot in 2020, the film debuted at the Toronto International Film Festival last year and tells the story of a young girl who, after an unspeakable tragedy, begins to slowly unravel her family’s dark history.
Dolan’s debut feature has been widely praised by critics, even scooping the Jury Prize for Best Film at the Gérardmer Film Festival in France last year.
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Close to 100% want to remain part of the UK. Case closed. UK has a duty of care for its citizens.
But they left Hong Kong ! Locals wanted them to stay then as well. No consistency !
The 100 year lease was up on Hongkong. They wudv been happy to stay.
The Falkland Islands has vast deposits of oil around them , thats the difference!
No the difference is the lease on Hong Kong was expired. It was always agreed to be Chinese sovereign soil. The Falklands or Malvinas as Argentina calls them is British sovereign soil and never had an indigenous Argentinian population and was claimed by Britain and settlers landed. And the Chinese armed forces are much stronger than Argentinas.
The Brits are also trying to claim rockall. There is no one living there. It’s off the coast of Donegal. There might be oil off its coast !
@stefanovich. Of course almost 100% of them want to remain part of the uk. Sure didn’t the Brits plant them there in the same way they planted their citizens in Northern Ireland during the plantations of Ulster. In the words of the wolf tones “islas maldivas Argentina”
Sure why wouldn’t they vote 100% they are all bloody British planters that didn’t give them the right to an island.
And in 2014 Ireland more or less handed/recognised rockall as been part of the U.K..
Peter, they have lived there for generations, if they were of Irish extraction you would be supporting them but kets bash them coz they are British!
Indeed they did. Can’t beat a fine Gael government for licking the Brits ass. Can you remember bruton when their prince visited in 1994. He was near wetting himself with excitement. It took a month to clean the brown off his nose he did that much ass licking.
The lease didn’t cover all the territory ( admittedly a large 86%) but only half the people lived on the leased land. The other half lived in territory ceded to Britain in perpetuity.
Amazing the usual reaction to anything British yet we run around like scalded cats and sent half the cabinet over there to beg them to stay in Europe our best friends and neighbors we are so bloody two faced.The Brits should cut ties with the North but not force them into a united Ireland,cut trade ties with us,send the three quarters of a million Irish Immigrants living in the UK back here,cease theCTA and let Us defend our own air space.Happy now?Oh I forgot keep saying sorry for the next eight hundred years and say it was ok for us to bomb the uk sure they understand.
The majority of Scottish people want to remain in Europe, yet Westminster doesn’t want them to, where’s the UK’s duty of care to Scottish citizens?
The government has a duty to care to the entire United Kingdom. Some regions may have enhanced devolved government, but there is no legal personality for “Scotland”, or for “England” or “Wales” or “N.I.” Thus, the desires and interests of Scots cannot be separated from those of the Welsh, Northern Irish and English.
Do they ever stop. Its not even like the residents are of Argentinian decent….
They can conquer any place. Just invade kill locals . Move British people there and bingo. Wonder where else that happened !
Connor the Falklands do not have that sort of history. The Island was not historically inhabited to my knowledge
But nobody lived on the Falklands Conor. They’re 500km from South America. Argentina’s claim is nonsense.
Conor, Northern Ireland and the Falklands are not comparable. No native population existed to be displaced, in fact British settlers were the first and only long-term inhabitants.
So if China moved a few people onto Skellig Michael it’s ok for them to claim it because it’s not inhabited?
Being that people have previously lived on Skellig Michael, your analogy doesn’t work
No skelligs where inhabited once by Irish. Falklands weren’t inhabitated
It’s not the same, Seth. The Falklands were first inhabited by British people, and that was before Argentina came into existence. Skellig Michael was first inhabited (the buildings can still be seen today) by Irish people and remains under the jurisdiction of Irish people as well as being just a few miles out to see from Ireland (as opposed to the Falklands’ 500 miles out from Argentina).
The Brits are also laying claim to rockall. There is no one living there. It’s off the coast of Donegal!
and how far from the UK ? Which makes their claim, by your logic, absolutely nonsense.
You say off the coast of Donegal as if the difference in distance to it from Ireland and from the UK isn’t just roughly 30km. And that the closest inhabited island to it is British not Irish. And the only reason Ireland, U.K. Iceland and Denmark all claim it is gas oil. Otherwise even we wouldn’t want that rock
Seth dont be an idiot! No comparison, another chip on your shoulder just because they are British maybe?
People did previously live on the Malvinas
Not Argentineans anyway and not permanent. Also not until about 70 years after the British claimed it either. All prior to the formation of Argentina also
Tell you what Argentina, let’s cut a deal…
All Falkland islanders (who are descended from British colonists) will leave the islands and ‘return’ to Britain leaving the islands to the penguins and seals.
In return all Argentinians who are descendants of Spanish colonists must leave Argentina and ‘return’ to Spain, leaving Argentina to it’s original native Amerindian population.
How about it? Deal or no deal?
Rockall is closer to Scotland than it is to Ireland Conor.
Educate yourself Conor before spouting rubbish the Falklands were uninhabited and abandoned when Britain arrived. The last residents were the Spanish who were there till 1811 when they decided to leave. The Argentines have little to no claim, just corrupt politicians trying to gain votes as usual
The UK’s argument regarding the Falkland Islands is that it was uninhabited and unclaimed when they got there is correct however they’re not exactly consistent with that argument when is comes to Gibraltar which was seized from Spain under a treaty between the British and the Dutch… as usual they seem to want it both ways…
Not true Shane , it’s nearer the Irish main land than the Scottish mainland , so the British claim is invalid
Why would it be invalid Ollie?The nearest permanently inhabited place is North Uist, an island in the Outer Hebrides of Scotland, 370 km (230 miles) to the east.
Anyway it doesn’t matter because on 7 November 1988 the United Kingdom and Ireland made an agreement dividing the territory so this debate is pointless.
International Maritime law states it must be from a national main land , not an island off another island off another island , so to are still wrong , so therefore Ireland is nearer , I don’t need to quote km, so your are incorrect even in a pointless debate lol
The day they invaded, was the day they lost any chance it get the Falklands back.
Actually Fuegians (are one of the three tribes of indigenous inhabitants of Tierra del Fuego) have been there before anyone. Then Europeans found the island and laid claim (it’s mine now, kind of attitude). England has the first recorded landing there, so we just have to take their word, just because they wrote about them first. Who’s to say the indigenous people didn’t have their own recorded history that was destroyed by time or on purpose. Plus history is mainly only ever written by the victors angle.
There is absolutely zero evidence that the Fuegians or anyone else settled them before Europeans arrived, unless you know something nobody else does. Would you like to back up your statement?
Complete fabrication. The Falklands were completely devoid of a human population before Europeans arrived.
In the eyes of the Falklanders, Argentina has behaved with bad faith since 1982, breaking every agreement – from sea travel to oil exploration.
The Argentinians do not accept the rights of native-born Falklanders, let alone incomers.
History is on the islanders’ side. For 90 years, there wasn’t a mention of sovereignty by the Argentinians, until their ambassador went to the UN in 1964.
That speech was littered with 60 historical inaccuracies, but it sowed the seeds for the future – leaving Argentina’s military dictators free to invade in 1982 to distract the public from a collapsing economy.
Incidentally, the British settlement in the Falklands has existed virtually for the same amount of time as an independent Argentina.
While Argentina claims Islanders are interlopers, they ignore that their own occupation of South America was colonialism.
@: Avina laaf: Since I live here, many books in Spanish if you want. I am coming back next week and can show you. Seriously you can do your own research biblioteca national has many books on it. Very interesting actually. http://www.bn.gov.ar/buscar/malvinas
Plus where is your evidence that fuegians they did not? Would you like to back up your statement?
@ the oracle of Delphi: says who? The Europeans that found them?
Says multilple sources. There is some evidence of possible previous native American settlement but it’s inconclusive. The islands were deserted when Europeans arrived.
@: the oracle of Delphi: in my post above, the link show multiple sources also. Well if there is that evidence then since the nearest land mass would be what is now called Argentina. No?
You want me to prove a negative to rebut your claim? It doesn’t work that way – google ‘Russell’s teapot’ – but either way, the evidence is a complete lack of evidence.
There are no archaeological remains of native settlement on the Falklands and not one of the early explorers – of various nationalities – reported a single sign of early habitation.
Native south americans were known to engage in coastal seal hunts but there’s zero evidence that they had the skills or equipment required to cross 500km of the South Atlantic – some of the most hostile waters on the planet.
@:avina Laff: actually Russell’s teapot is used for extreme cases. There is a counter argument to it. You are saying that people living close to 11,000km were more likely to discover an island (which is only 500km) than the local indigenous.
And actually locals had the technology to travel the distance. Try reading the following,
While Amerindians from Patagonia have visited the Falklands,[1] [2] the islands were uninhabited when discovered by Europeans.[3] Recent discoveries of arrowheads in Lafonia (on the southern half of East Falkland) as well as the remains of a wooden canoe provide evidence that the Yaghan people of Tierra del Fuego may have made the journey to the islands.
[1] Getting it right: the real history of the Falklands/Malvinas. A reply to the Argentine seminar of 3 December 2007 by Graham Pascoe and Peter Pepper © 2008
And
[2] Barnard, Charles H., A narrative of the sufferings and adventures of Capt. Charles H. Barnard.
^ Weddell, James, A Voyage Towards the South Pole, London, Longman, Rees, Orme, Brown and Green, 1827
^ a b c Laurio H. Destéfani, The Malvinas, the South Georgias and the South Sandwich Islands, the conflict with Britain, Buenos Aires, 1982
I read somewhere that St Brendan landed there in 530 on his way back from America.
Finders, keepers. Send over the Niamh. It’s docked in Galway. Should be there in no time.
Brits don’t stand a chance
Shes probably busy doing taxi in the Med.
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Tomothy, the fauna provided enough of a clue. The only mammal native to the Falklands (the seals are migratory) was a now-extinct relative of the Maned Wolf known as the Warrah. The early settlers noted that they were extremely easy to kill – you could lure them in with food in one hand while clubbing them with the other – because they had no fear of humans. Being isolated from the mainland, they hadn’t developed the instinctive fear seen in wild animals where humans live in proximity. No evidence of their having met humans before.
What Argentina need is another admiral William brown … The Brits won’t be long handing it over then . He did chase them out of there before ..
When? Was that the Prequel to the Falklands War? because i can recall the Argentine’s chasing anyone off the Falklands
What I thought was odd was how common memorials to the 650 dead soldiers and sailers on the malvinas were (lots of small towns have them) , but how few memorials there were to the 30 to 40 thousand disappeared… Especially since the military regime only invaded the Falklands to distract from what was happening at home
When England can no longer pay the suggestion they will let it go.
Argentines are ludicrous. The British were first to make a claim to the Falkland Islands, 200 years before Argentina even came to existence. Argentina’s claim comes from a later Franco/Spanish claim that fails first due to it being a latter claim, and second on the preposterous notion that a revolutionary government can take de iuris possession of its predecessor’s claims (so Spain, again, has better claim than Argentina). And while it is true that there was some semblance of government control by 1830, it was destroyed by Americans who saw it as a threat to their whaling operations – thus it can be said that there were people on the islands when the British exercised their rights of property, they were transient fishermen and not an organized government.
Legality aside, in a defensive war Britain is stronger than all of South American put together, and with expanded runways on Ascension, St. Helena and East Falkland, can now deploy overwhelming force in a matter of hours instead of weeks. That’s why it has a seat on the Security Council.
The equivalences with other overseas territories also break down:
Gibraltar was transferred to Britain by treaty, and no one rational cannot acknowledge this fact. Gibraltar would like have joined the family of nations already if Spain wasn’t so petulant for land that has been outside its control for longer than they ever had it. Not to mention their hypocrisy when it comes to their exclaves on the Moroccan coast. And again, Britain has the military advantage – not only by itself, but through the immediate activation of NATO and the guaranteed arming of Catalan and Basque separatists
Hong Kong was to intricate to break apart, and maybe outside Cold War politics, could have been divided with concerted effort, the truth is that the Chinese held all the cards. Not only could the Chinese not be removed if they invaded, the previous government’s had stupidly allowed China to control Hong Kong’s fresh water supply and were more than happy to cut it off. The irony is, that Chinese rule chafes Hong Kong, and an independence movement is developing.
As for Diego Garcia, I feel for the Chagosians. But the fact remains that the only inhabitable island is under American control, and they’re unlikely to ever leave.
Didnt realise the had extended the runways. I was expecting something like operation black buck again where they flew bombers from cornwall to thevislands. :P
Back during the Falklands War, RTÉ news bulletins in English referred to the islands as The Falklands, ach le linn Nuacht as Gaeilge, thugadar “Na hOileáin Mailbhíneach” orthu. #SittinhOnThe Feet!
You may find that the Malvinas did have local residents at the time of the British arrival. Fishermen, who were shipped back to the mainland. As for proximity…. Really!!!
And what relationship did those fishermen have with the current population of Argentina? They probably slaughtered them
And what actual physical evidence of these fishermen having ever existed is there?
They didn’t Liam. The English (it was that long ago that it was pre-Act of Union) were the firat to set foot on the islands. The first permanent settlement was built by the French, two years before the British built one (although neither side knew of the other’s existence at the time). These settlements were both eventually deserted owing to conflicts abroad (the Spanish having taken over the French settlement). The Argentinians later tried a couple of times to (illegally) found a colony of their own – these failed due to mutinies and an attack by the US Navy in retaliation for Argentinian piracy. When the British finally restored order in 1833 they expelled what remained of the Argentinian military garrison but offered the civilian settlers the chance to stay – most of them did.
Hong Kong , Diego Garcia.
Clearly the residents wishes only matter when they coincide with the British governments wishes.
Spain should walk in and take Gibraltar back and Argentina should take back the Malvinas and expel the colonists if they don’t accept Argentine rule.
Hong Kong was leased as previously stated, so when that ended it didn’t matter if they wanted to stay or not. So completely different situation
haha cute..
Presumably then you also think that native amerindians should walk in and take Argentina back, and expel the descendants of Spanish colonists?
The underlying reason for both Argentinas claim and Britain’s claim wouldn’t be the massive oil and gas field’s located in the Falkland territorial water’s, would it????
Well being that the British have claimed it long before undersea oil or gas would even have been a thing would say no. Not that it isn’t a factor now. But wasn’t for their original claim. Argentina is a bit more dubious as for their reasons
The argies are a pain in the hole. Maybe focus on actually learning how to run their own country first. The place is a shambles in terms of governance.
The Argies do moan a lot…. but they have no military anymore, so really, why bother?
Argentina, this is a great idea…the Brits are divided at home and not too sure of the way forward so this is a good time to give them a focus which will unite them behind their military.
Yeah, Ascension Island’s was finished a few years ago, I think, at American behest. St. Helena’s just finished this year. I think that they’re both rated for commercial use as well.
I think them, along with Tristan da Cunha are fascinating – literally single mountains breaching the middle of the ocean, with nothing around for thousands of miles.
The present population of Argentina are descendants of Spanish settlers who wiped out the indigenous population in a genocidal war, so why do they think they have a right to the Falklands?
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