Johnny Creedon:WINNER OF the amateur equivalent of an Oscar, film-maker Johnny Creedon, who has died aged 62, was also a keen deerstalker and a highly regarded wildlife photographer.
He will probably best be remembered in his home town of Macroom, Co Cork, for a superb film that profiled a day in the life of the market town. He is also known the length and breadth of the country as a former chairman of the Wild Deer Association of Ireland.
In the world of amateur film-making, he first made his mark as director of a picture titled For the Love of Annie, a poignant love story of a young woman whose life is destroyed by drug abuse.
Although screened 27 years ago, it still has relevance as it charts the devastating toll of drug addiction both on Annie’s life and that of her lover.
Made by the Lana Film Group, a dedicated band of enthusiastic amateurs founded in the mid- 1970s, it scooped a top award in the Ten Best Amateur Films of a prestigious UK competition running since 1936 and regarded as the amateur equivalent of the Oscars.
Featuring scenes from pubs and other haunts in Macroom, Dingle and Cork city, it also won the award as the best amateur film at the Dublin Film Festival in 1985.
Among other film gems made by the amateur director, a Day in the Life of Macroom charts the life and times of the local community in the course of a busy fair day.
Starting at 6am, the historic documentary depicts traders putting up stalls in the town square, follows the rounds of the local postman, eavesdrops on a meeting of the town council, joins in a lively pub music session and closes with the timeless image of a fisherman casting his line on the river Sullane at dusk.
Once more combining with members of the film group and with the intimate knowledge of John Vaughan, the cinema’s former projectionist, Creedon made yet another award-winning film titled The Last Picture Show, a 22-minute documentary about the closing of the town’s cinema.
Using old ads and posters, 18 months was spent on the project.
The film takes the form of an imaginary last showing of a picture at the Palace, which closed in 1954, a venue where generations of Macrompians had gone to the pictures until its closure in 1987. Remarkably, that film also ranked among the Ten Best Amateur Films of its time.
A painter and decorator by trade, he was a keen yachtsman and a good shot. Involved in deerstalking and bird-shooting all his life, he was chairman of the Wild Deer Association of Ireland from 2005-2008 and played an important part in its growth to national status. As chairman, he actively promoted the association’s “vision of a vital, working and thriving countryside for the benefit of the whole nation”.
He pursued its aims of “campaigning, lobbying, publicity and education to influence legislation and public policy that impacts on the countrywide, rural people and their activities”.
In a tribute on his contribution to the organisation over 20 years, the association said he had “unselfishly devoted his time to the betterment of Ireland’s wild deer herds”.
On a more personal note, it observed that in his company, fellow hunters and lovers of the rural way of life “were always guaranteed a good story with the John Creedon humour added for good measure”.
He is survived by his sister, Julie Ash.
John Creedon: born March 17th, 1947; died January 17th, 2010