A NEW Neil Jordan horror film, a reimagining of Jim Sheridan’s Into the West, and six animation projects are to share in more than €5.3 million of funding from the Irish Film Board.
The board, which has announced its latest funding round, says it will contribute to productions worth €38 million.
Some €4.755 million will go on production funding and €578,894 on development loans. Development loans are given to help get a film made and have to be paid back on the first day of shooting.
The beneficiaries also include the first Irish-Singapore collaboration called Mister John,and director Steph Green's first feature film Run and Jump, which was selected for the Sundance Institute's Screenwriter's Lab.
Jordan's latest feature is a horror film that concerns the activities of a mother and daughter vampire duo. The high-profile cast includes Saoirse Ronan, Bond girl Gemma Arterton and X-Menstar Caleb Landry.
The project is being shot in Ardmore Studios and around Dublin and Wicklow, and has a budget close to €10 million.
Director Peter McDonald, whose award-winning short Pentecost made a splash on the international festival circuit last year, received development funding for The Steamroller, which he will co-write with Irish actor Michael McElhatton, who will also star in the project.
Jim Sheridan is also developing a reimagined version of the 1992 feature Into the West, about a family of Dublin Travellers who go to the west of Ireland looking for a stolen horse. That film is in development.
The strength of the animation industry is recognised in the six projects approved for funding.
Brown Bag Films, who are up for a children’s Bafta this weekend for their cartoon series Octonauts, have won development support for The Wooden Sword.
Boulder Media has received money for the animated feature film entitled Astrid Silverlock & the Staff of Virtue. It is due to be released next year.
Igloo Films has got funding for its animated feature film The Boy in the Bubble,which is narrated by the actor Alan Rickman and features a 10-year-old boy who falls in love for the first time.
Film board chief executive James Hickey said the announcements showed how strong the Irish film and television industry was despite the recession. He said the money would aid another year of sustained activity for the Irish film, television and animation industry.
