FILMING for a short drama about the Irish Famine, aimed at 10-13 year olds, began on the Northside last week.
‘The Hunger Times’ explores the legacy of the Great Irish Famine and its relevance in a modern context.
Ireland’s Great Hunger Museum (IGHM) at Quinnipiac University in Connecticut commissioned the drama through an open competition.
The film will be released in February 2018, to coincide with ‘Coming Home: Art and the Great Hunger’, a national exhibition which will see a large part of IGHM’s collection returning to Ireland.
The collection will be exhibited in Dublin Castle and West Cork Arts Centre, Skibbereen, next year.
Curator of the exhibition, Niamh O’Sullivan, said: “This short film is a wonderful opportunity to educate young people about the Great Famine, its legacy and, particularly, how it resonates with us in a contemporary context.”
Written by Hannah Salt (Bump, Rabbit Punch) and directed by Keith Farrell (A Terrible Beauty, Death or Liberty, Rabbit Punch), the film takes inspiration from art works from ‘Coming Home: Art and the Great Hunger’. Tile Media is filming on location in north county Dublin.
Director, Keith Farrell said: “When I saw the call for submissions for a children’s film from the folks at Ireland’s Great Hunger Museum at Quinipiac University in Connecticut built around their fantastic collection of art works and artefacts my interest was immediately piqued.
“The catastrophic Gorta Mór/The Great Hunger is deeply ingrained in both the Irish and Irish American psyche and whilst it has been addressed in documentary and to a lesser extent in drama, I believe our film, ‘The Hunger Times’, will be the first occasion when a famine story has been told through the eyes of children.”