This article is from page 14 of the 2011-04-26 edition of The Clare People. OCR mistakes are to be expected so download the original SWF or the rendered page 14 JPG
A NORTH Clare man has given the Irish film industry a major boost by helping secure the first major international award for Irish documentary The Pipe .
Ennistymon native Eoghan McGuire emigrated from North Clare during the last recession in the 1980s and, after spending some time in America, he went on to live in Würzburg in German.
Once settled in Germany he set up a GAA club, St Kilian’s, and over the past decade a film society has developed in the club during the winter months. In recent years, Eoghan has become very involved in the prestigious Würzburg Film Festival and this year he managed to convince the organisers to bring Irish documentary The Pipe to Germany.
The film was shown at the festival last week and was followed by a talk from director Risteard Ó Domhnaill. The film went down so well that, despite the language barrier, the film was voted Best Documentary by the German audience – the film’s first international award.
“I had heard about The Pipe a long while ago and I managed to get to a screening and to meet the director in Galway. I felt that there was a profound message there and a message that could translated to a German audience,” said Eoghan.
“It is a tale that is definitely worth telling and the theme of a small community up against a big multi-national is something that I though would appeal to the audience over here. This is an audience award, which means it was the film goers and not critics or experts who picked it, so that is important.
“I think that this can be a stepping stone for the film. Once you win an award in one European festival it makes it easier for it to be shown in other film festivals and hopefully that will be the case for The Pipe .
“I normally look for an Irish film that would appeal to the crowd. We like to scout out up and coming Irish films that otherwise might not get the chance to be on the film circuit in Europe. It is as much about encouraging small Irish films into Europe as it is about the festival itself. We don’t have strict criteria; it’s really about bringing quality films over here,” he said. The Pipe beat out competition from a number of German documentaries as well as films from Canada, Switzerland, Finland, Belgium and France to win the award.