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Lola Petticrew, an Irish actor whose career has only recently gotten started, has had a recent run of movie and television performances that is setting up the actor for an impressive and celebrated filmography that fans will want to keep an eye on. Born in Belfast, Northern Ireland, Petticrew began their professional career with the 2017 short film, Sparrow. Mainstream work came the next year, in 2018, when Petticrew appeared in small roles in Come Home and Next of Kin. While they would go on to have a notable movie career, it's TV where Petticrew has made the biggest impact.

Petticrew has identified as queer and non-binary since they were 14, though they consider their work in Dating Amber, a coming-of-age dramedy about two closeted teens in 1990s Ireland, as the moment they learned to fully embrace their gender and sexuality (via TheQueerReview). For most of their career, Petticrew has appeared in Irish TV and movie productions,...

The Sniper’s Daughter

We’ve had to wait a while for Oorlagh George‘s directorial debut to shore up and we’ll definitely be getting a taste in ’23. It’s gestated long enough to already have a change in titles moving from “Stranger With A Camera” to what will be now be known as The Sniper’s Daughter. The Belfast-born filmmaker developed the feature through Sundance Institute’s Screenwriting and Directing Labs and among her cast we find Ellie Bamber, Owen McDonnell, Michael Shea, and Brian Milligan. George produced alongside Mary Ann Marino, Molly Egan and John Wallace.

Gist: A troubled American teen is stranded in Northern Ireland when her father is suddenly arrested for an Ira related murder from seventeen years prior.…...

Exclusive: Veteran UK sales agent Anthony Buckner, former Head of Sales at Icon, is launching Buckstop Films to coincide with the Cannes Marché.

First movie on the slate is supernatural horror Jump Out, which will star Lucien Laviscount (The Bye Bye Man), Hannah Arterton (Safe), Eugene Simon (Games Of Thrones), Alice Hewkin (Sex Education), Aaron Cobham (The Spanish Princess) and Brian Milligan (Hunger).

In Jump Out, which is scheduled to shoot later this year in the Canary Islands, a group of university friends find themselves stranded on a seemingly deserted island after a cliff jump goes wrong. But they soon discover they are not alone and face horrors they could never have imagined.

The movie comes from UK writer-director Benjamin Johns , who has been BAFTA-nominated for his shorts work. Mike Spragg Bsc is the cinematographer. Djonny Chen of Silent D Pictures (Daemon Mind) is producing alongside Johns through his Eye Cue Films International.

Anthony Buckner is debuting the firm during Cannes with first title ‘Jump Out’.

Former Icon Entertainment executive Anthony Buckner is launching his own sales firm, Buckstop Films, and has acquired worldwide rights to Benjamin Johns’ supernatural horror Jump Out.

Run solely by Buckner, UK-based Buckstop will handle “one or two films a year to begin with” according to the exec.

.“I am open to all budget sizes, and am in talks with several projects across various genres,” he said.

Buckner will be participating in virtual meetings during next week’s Cannes Film Festival (July 6-17), and will not be attending the event in person.

Anthony Buckner is debuting the firm during Cannes with first title ‘Jump Out’.

Former Icon Entertainment executive Anthony Buckner is launching his own sales firm, Buckstop Films, and has acquired worldwide rights on a first title – upcoming supernatural horror Jump Out.

Run solely by Buckner at this stage, UK-based Buckstop will handle “one or two films a year to begin with” according to the exec.

“With current restrictions starting to loosen and the market starting to reboot, it felt like as good a time as any to re-enter the game with Buckstop Films,” said Buckner. “I am open to all budget sizes,...

Stranger with a Camera

Belfast-born filmmaker Oorlagh George will be ready to present her narrative debut Stranger with a Camera in 2021, developed through Sundance Institute’s Screenwriting and Directing Labs. Among her cast is Ellie Bamber, Owen McDonnell, Michael Shea, and Brian Milligan. George produced her own feature alongside Mary Ann Marino, Molly Egan and John Wallace. Initially an assistant to Clive Owen in the early 2000s, George nabbed an Academy Award for Best Short Live Action Film with “The Shore” in 2012. Her father is Terry George of In the Name of the Father and Hotel Rwanda fame.…...

Evolution also launching Everest horror ‘Frostbite’ and student thriller ‘Jump’.

Altitude has boarded UK rights on Howard J. Ford’s Lockdown Hauntings, a pandemic-themed horror produced by the UK’s Evolution Pictures that is now in post.

The distributor is planning a theatrical release for the film around March 2021 to mark the anniversary of the first lockdown.

Lockdown Hauntings follows a notorious serial killer who recently died in prison, but is back from the dead and on the prowl for isolated young women during the Covid-19 lockdown.

The cast includes horror stalwart Tony Todd, who has previously appeared in the Candyman and Final Destination franchises,...

Oorlagh George set sail on her directorial debut earlier this year in Northern Ireland on Stranger With A Camera – a project that was supported by both the Sundance Institute’s Screenwriting and Directing Labs in the same year as popular Park City items Patti Cake$ and Swiss Army Man. Starring Ellie Bamber, Owen McDonnell, Michael Shea and Brian Milligan, this Ira drama is about trauma, something we find in her father’s cinema. Oh and worth point out, she produced the Oscar winning short, The Shore. Update: This film is not ready and was not submitted.

Gist: The story centers around a troubled American teenager stranded in a Northern Irish village after her father is arrested for a 17-year-old murder tied to the Ira.…...

Calamity Films, the UK producer behind Judy, for which Renée Zellweger recently won an Oscar, has named Sam Gordon as its head of development. Gordon joins from BBC Films, where he worked as a development executive on projects including recent Sundance pic Herself and the upcoming People Just Do Nothing: Big In Japan, as well as Judy which the BBC backed. He also had prior roles at Magnolia Mae Films and Baby Cow, working on Stan & Ollie and Philomena. At Calamity, Gordon will report to founder David Livingstone and will work across film and TV projects.

The fourth Seafic lab, which nurtures Southeast Asian films, will welcome filmmakers including Palme d’Or winner Apichatpong Weerasethakul for its 2020 edition. Five projects will take part, including a new feature from Locarno Golden Leopard-winning A Land Imagined producer Fran Borgia, and Locarno-winning The Science Of Fictions producer Yulia Evina Bhar. The teams this year hail from Indonesia,...

Ellie Bamber stars, with Owen McDonnell and Michael Shea.

Principal photography has begun in Northern Ireland on Stranger With A Camera, the debut feature from Oscar-winning producer Oorlagh George.

Written and directed by George, the project was developed through the Sundance Institute’s Screenwriting and Directing labs. The filmmaker won an Oscar for producing short film, The Shore, directed by her father, Terry George, whose feature credits include In The Name Of The Father and Some Mother’s Son.

Stranger With A Camera stars Ellie Bamber (BBC’s Les Misérables) with Owen McDonnell (Killing Eve), Michael Shea (Derry Girls) and Brian Milligan...

Ellie Bamber stars, with Owen McDonnell and Michael Shea.

Principal photography has begun in Northern Ireland on Stranger With A Camera, the debut feature from Oscar-winning producer Oorlagh George.

Written and directed by George, the project was developed through the Sundance Institute’s Screenwriting and Directing labs. The filmmaker won an Oscar for producing short film, The Shore, directed by her father, Terry George, whose feature credits include In The Name Of The Father and Some Mother’s Son.

Stranger With A Camera stars Ellie Bamber (BBC’s Les Misérables) with Owen McDonnell (Killing Eve), Michael Shea (Derry Girls) and Brian Milligan...

Ellie Bamber stars, with Owen McDonnell and Michael Shea.

Principal photography has begun in Northern Ireland on Stranger With A Camera, the debut feature from Oscar-winning producer Oorlagh George.

Written and directed by George, the project was developed through the Sundance Institute’s Screenwriting and Directing labs. The filmmaker won an Oscar for producing short film, The Shore, directed by her father, Terry George, whose feature credits include In The Name Of The Father and Some Mother’s Son.

Stranger With A Camera stars Ellie Bamber (BBC’s Les Misérables) with Owen McDonnell (Killing Eve), Michael Shea (Derry Girls) and Brian Milligan...

Stars: Nigel O’Neill, Susan Lynch, Józef Pawlowski, Stuart Graham, David Pearse, Anna Próchniak, Stella McCusker, Ian McElhinney, Brian Milligan, Shashi Rami, Lalor Roddy, Ryan McParland | Written by Chris Baugh, Brendan Mullin | Directed by Chris Baugh

Northern Ireland is pretty well known for having its fair share of “troubles” and as such makes for a pretty bleak backdrop to a dark, twisted and, at times, awkwardly funny tale of revenge, a camper van road trip, suicide and the murder of a mans mother… First rule of being a baddie, don’t mess with another guys mother, especially the quiet farmer type.

Donal (Nigel O’Neill) is a quiet lonesome farmer still living at home in a quiet Irish village with his mother (yes, his mother) Florence (Stella McCusker) . Donal spends his days fixing up the farm and drinking himself to sleep. When we meet him the only real thing he...

I've got a trailer here for a new film called Bad Day For The Cut, which you've got to watch! If you like crazy violent revenge thrillers, then this is the movie for you. The story follows a farmer named Donal (Nigel O’Neil) who goes on a murderous revenge adventure after his mother is killed by some kind of organized crime gang. What follows is the journey of a man who won't rest until everyone involved with his mom's death is violently destroyed.

This film has a very gritty and hardcore look and feel, and it's set to premiere at the Sundance Film Festival this month. It's definitely on my list of things I hope to see while I'm there! It looks like it's going to be a wild and intense ride.

The move marks the feature film debut of director Chris Baugh, and it comes from a script written by Brendan Mullin.

The first trailer has arrived for the ultra-violent revenge thriller Bad Day For The Cut, which will make its premiere at this year’s Sundance Film Festival. The feature debut of director Chris Baugh, the film follows Donal (Nigel O’Neil) who goes on a murderous quest after his mother is killed by some sort of gang (led by David Pearse). What ensues is a barrage of hammers, double-barreled shotguns, and fisticuffs in the wilderness of Ireland, all bound around the age-old concept of revenge.

Baugh also penned the script along with frequent collaborator Brendan Mullin, who have both worked on numerous shorts before taking the leap into Bad Day. Hopefully the film stands tall among some of its contemporary peers such as Blue Ruin, Kill List, and Taken. See the full trailer below, along with a neat poster and synopsis, for the film that also stars Game of Thrones’ Ian McElhinney,...

Network: Netflix

Episodes: 16 (hour)

Seasons: Three

TV show dates: May 28, 2013 -- present

Series status: Ending

Performers include: Gillian Anderson, Jamie Dornan, Laura Donnelly, Bronagh Waugh, Niamh McGrady, Michael McElhatton, Ben Peel, Frank McCusker, John Lynch, Ian McElhinney, Archie Panjabi, Stuart Graham, Aisling Franciosi, Valene Kane, Emmett J. Scanlan, Bronágh Taggart, Karen Hassan, Jonjo O'Neill, Nick Lee, Colin Morgan, Brian Milligan, Séainín Brennan, and Sean McGinley.

TV show description:      

This crime drama is set in Northern Ireland and follows senior investigating officer Stella Gibson (Gillian Anderson). She must temporarily leave her position to enter the Police Service of Northern Ireland to oversee the progress of a murder investigation that has gone on for too long -- Operation Musicman.

When she discovers exactly what is going on in the case, she must work with the local detectives to find...

Director Steve McQueen's first feature film, about Bobby Sands and the 1981 hunger strike, captures the humanity and brutality on both sides of the conflict in the Hm Prison Maze

• Steve McQueen: my hidden shame

Hunger (2008)

Director: Steve McQueen

Entertainment grade: B+

History grade: B+

Bobby Sands was a member of the Provisional Ira. He led a hunger strike against conditions in Hm Prison Maze, Northern Ireland, in 1981.

Chronology

12 Years a Slave director Steve McQueen's first feature film opens with a prison warder (Stuart Graham) going to work. We see snatches of his day: checking under his car for bombs, washing his bloodied knuckles in a sink, smoking a cigarette outside in the snow with large sweat stains on his shirt for reasons yet unknown. The voice of Margaret Thatcher, the prime minister, is heard: "There's no such thing as political murder, political bombing or political violence. There is only criminal murder,...

It has been several weeks since any Criterion films have found their way onto the list of films available on Netflix Watch Instantly. There were a few months where every other week we saw dozens of Criterion films added.

In a very auspicious act, Netflix has added Steve McQueen’s 2008 film, Hunger, to their Watch Insantly selection. It is auspicious in that we are going to be recording a podcast this Friday, June 11th, discussing this harrowing film with a special guest!

The film dramatically recreates the imprisonment of Bobby Sands, an Ira member who goes on a six week long hunger strike, through an incredible performance by Michael Fassbender.

This film was released several months ago by Criterion (as part of their deal with IFC Films) on DVD and Blu-ray. So listeners who are eager to join in on the discussion have yet another format with which to watch the film on.

There are performances, rare though they may be, that come in and grab you by the short and curlies. There is no denying Daniel Day Lewis in There Will Be Blood, Heath Ledger in The Dark Knight, and David Thewlis in Naked. In Steve McQueen’s Hunger, Michael Fassbender gives one of those performances that you have to genuflect in awe. It’s not because for the last section of the film he drops more weight than Christian Bale did for The Machinist. That’s a great commitment, for sure, and shows a dedicated performer. But it’s a scene in the middle of the film that plays out in three shots over twenty minutes that shows the man has the gift to command - he makes it impossible to take you eyes off of him. Playing the real-life Bobby Sands, in one scene Fassbender lays out his plan for a hunger strike,...

(Director Steve McQueen and actor Michael Fassbender, as Bobby Sands, in Hunger.)

With his debut feature, the filmmaker reminds us that rules of movie-making are ripe for the breaking.

By Terry Keefe

This article is currently appearing in this month's Venice Magazine.

Steve McQueen was first introduced to Bobby Sands, the subject of McQueen's feature film Hunger, via a news photo of Sands, which McQueen vividly remembers from when he was 11-years old. Sands was the leader of the 1981 Ira Hunger Strike which took place in the notorious Maze Prison in Northern Ireland and the first of ten men who would ultimately die during the protest. Recalls McQueen, “This image of a man appeared on television, with a number. I thought it was the person’s age, but then my mother told me it was a hunger strike.” The number indicated how many days Sands had been starving himself. McQueen...

See the trailer for Steve McQueen's "Hunger" drama starring Michael Fassbender, Stuart Graham, Brian Milligan, Laine Megaw, Larry Cowan and Lalor Roddy. McQueen makes his writing and directing debut on the project which is being distributed by IFC Films. See the trailer now! See the official site here - http://ifcfilms.com/viewFilm.htm?filmId=1197 What's it about? Hunger is the stunningly assured debut feature from Turner Prize-winning visual artist Steve McQueen. Winner of the 2008 Cannes Camera d’Or among other top international prizes, the film is a work of astonishing precision co-written by acclaimed Irish playwright Enda Walsh and starring Michael Fassbender (300, Tarantino’s upcoming Inglourious Basterds) in an unflinchingly passionate turn. Hunger was an official selection of the Toronto, Telluride and New York film festivals. In 1981, a deadly serious battle takes place in the infamous H-block of Belfast’s Maze Prison. Republican inmates, led by Bobby Sands...

See the trailer for Steve McQueen's "Hunger" drama starring Michael Fassbender, Stuart Graham, Brian Milligan, Laine Megaw, Larry Cowan and Lalor Roddy. McQueen makes his writing and directing debut on the project which is being distributed by IFC Films. See the official site here - http://ifcfilms.com/viewFilm.htm?filmId=1197 Hunger is the stunningly assured debut feature from Turner Prize-winning visual artist Steve McQueen. Winner of the 2008 Cannes Camera d’Or among other top international prizes, the film is a work of astonishing precision co-written by acclaimed Irish playwright Enda Walsh and starring Michael Fassbender...

See the trailer for Steve McQueen's "Hunger" drama starring Michael Fassbender, Stuart Graham, Brian Milligan, Laine Megaw, Larry Cowan and Lalor Roddy. McQueen makes his writing and directing debut on the project which is being distributed by IFC Films. See the official site here - http://ifcfilms.com/viewFilm.htm?filmId=1197 Hunger is the stunningly assured debut feature from Turner Prize-winning visual artist Steve McQueen. Winner of the 2008 Cannes Camera d’Or among other top international prizes, the film is a work of astonishing precision co-written by acclaimed Irish playwright Enda Walsh and starring Michael Fassbender...

Film Review: Hunger

Cannes, Un Certain Regard

Turner Prize-winning artist Steve McQueen brings the key tenets required to win Britain's top honor for modern art to directing his first film, "Hunger", and so it is trite, grim and feebly provocative.

It tells of the last days of Bobby Sands, a Northern Irishman who died in 1981 in Belfast's hellish Maze Prison following a 66-day hunger strike. The film, which opened the Festival de Cannes' Un Certain Regard sidebar, combines scenes more suited to an art installation with static theatrical encounters and cliched flights of artistic fancy.

Violent, bleak and depressing, "Hunger" depicts lifelong Irish Republican Army fighter Sands (Michael Fassbender) as a martyr and may prosper where audiences are already inclined to that view, with prospects slim elsewhere.

No context is provided beyond the steely but patronizing words of British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher and there is no mention of the nature of the violent crimes perpetrated by Sands and his fellow inmates. Convicted on charges involving armed attacks and arson, Sands demanded the rights of a prisoner of war, which included wearing civilian clothes and the receipt of gift parcels.

Lacking any new insights on the fateful paradox that one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter or that the imposition of punitive measures demeans all parties, the film adds nothing to the debate over broader issues involving such places as Guantanamo Bay and Abu Graib.

McQueen and co-scripter Enda Walsh break the film into four uneven parts, with first the introduction of a brutal prison guard (Stuart Graham) and his suburban home life, which is prosaic save for the constant threat of being bombed or shot.

A new prisoner (Brian Milligan) enters the cell of an entrenched convict (Liam McMahon) who teaches him the ways of IRA rebellion, which included smearing the walls with blood and feces, smuggling notes and small items using bodily orifices, and bracing for the malevolent treatment of the prison guards.

Attention then moves to Sands, with a 22-minute scene in which he relates his ideals and plans to a weary priest (Liam Cunningham). The remainder of the film, in which Fassbender demonstrates a commitment to the demands of the role beyond the call of duty, shows in great detail the gruesome effect on a man's body of completely rejecting nourishment. It's not a pretty sight.

Cast: Michael Fassbender, Liam Cunningham, Stuart Graham, Brian Milligan, Liam McMahon. Director: Steve McQueen. Screenwriters: Enda Walsh, Steve McQueen. Producer: Laura Hastings-Smith, Robin Glitch; Director of Photography: Sean Bobbitt. Production Designer: Tom McCullagh. Music: David Holmes, Leo Abrahams. Costume designers: Anushia Nieradzik. Editor: Joe Walker. Executive producers: Jan Younghusband, Peter Carlton, Linda James, Edmund Coulthard, Iain Canning.

Sales agent: Icon Entertainment International

No MPAA rating, running time 100 mins.