THE Cork Film Festival, sponsored by Murphy’s Irish Stout, is one of the oldest film festivals in the world. Indeed, 1994 heralds the 39th season of the event in the lap of the Lee. For many involved in the film industry itself it is the most significant cultural landmark of every annual calendar. Over the years it has established itself as the film-makers festival by virtue of its commitment towards the blooding of new talent.

The strength of the sense of tradition involved in the festival can be gauged by the tones of reverence which can still be heard whenever the name of the founder of the event, the late Dermot Breen, is mentioned anywhere in Cork. Although the time of the year at which the festival takes place has varied down through the years, the past five celebrations of things celluloid in Cork have all taken place in the month of October and this year the film festival runs from October 2nd to 9th. Thanks to Theo Dorgan, now of Poetry Ireland and Mick Hannigan, outgoing Cinema Manager of the IFC, October has become firmly established as the month in which cinéastes everywhere dig deep into their pockets and head south.

The Cork Film Festival isn’t only just a symbol of the increasingly sophisticated interest in cinema in Ireland. It also packs the hard cash prizes and prestige of three film competitions, which add financial flesh and global kudos to the already substantial aesthetic bones of the festival’s cinematic Art-House appearance. The European Short Film Competition is Cork’s short film contest and it provides the richest cash award for short films in Europe - the ECU10,000 (IR£7,500) prize being funded by the European Commission.

There’s also an Irish Short Film Prize, which means that all Irish shorts screened at the Festival are in competition for the Gus Healy Trophy and a cash prize of IR£1,000 sponsored by AIB. Past winners of this section in Cork have usually fared very well in similar competitions abroad. Meanwhile, Cork’s Black & White Competition is the only international competition for black and white film. It’s actually more expensive to make films in black and white these days, so cash prizes are all the more welcome in this specialised genre. It is largely for these reasons that the Cork Film Festival is known as the film-maker’s outing. A “who’s who?” of Irish cinema past, present and future can be found there every year.

The festival’s commitment to the new and the unconventional has brought it it’s fair share of controversy, not least as one of the primary platforms for the introduction of the films of the French New Wave to the people of Ireland. In recent times, though, the most memorable commotion occurred at the showing of Martin Scorsese’s The Last Temptation Of Christ.

Amongst many other things, Scorsese’s film altered the storyline of the four Gospels to suggest that Jesus Christ actually eloped with Mary Magdalen and had a child by her instead of dying, being resurrected and ascending into heaven after forty days. The moral minority were out in force for the initial screenings of the film and there were notorious clashes outside the cinema between supporters of the film and their fundamentalist antagonists.

There have also been many outstanding visits by guests from all over the film world. One of the highlights, however, in the opinion of current Press Officer, Ruth Riddick, was the almost unannounced appearance at short notice of Angelica Huston a few years back at the Cork Opera House for the screening of a John Sayles film. As Huston was there purely in a private capacity she had agreed to photographs but declined to be interviewed. She was holidaying at the time.

It had been assumed that being a celebrity she would disappear shortly after the film had ended and do her own thing. However, to everyone’s delight she stayed for the entire film, was absolutely charming to all and remained in the Opera House for quite a number of drinks afterwards. So there you go. You never know who you might bump into at the Cork Film Festival!

There is definitely an intimacy about the Cork Film Festival which would, at first glance, seem at odds with the grandeur of the festival’s history and reputation as one of the most respected film spectacles in Europe. The short distance between the two main sites for the showing of the films, the Cork Opera House and the Triskel Arts Centre, is one good reason for the sense of community which develops amongst those who attend over the week. It’s only a brief walk from one centre to the other and one is bound to meet familiar faces and stop to chat about the various goings on at the festival.

There is also a fine restaurant in the Triskel Arts Centre and the more dedicated fans of the festival – those who attend the morning and afternoon screenings – tend to dine and socialise in the restaurant. It’s not long before everyone gets to know everyone else. Besides the restaurant at Triskel, there is the not insignificant presence of the fully licensed bar in the Cork Opera House where Murphy’s Irish Stout flows in hospitable abundance.

The Opera House itself is another attraction for cinema goers as it gives the younger members of the festival the opportunity to experience what it was like to watch films in an old theatrical auditorium.

This year, the festival opens with a gala screening of director/writer Whit Stillman’s sophisticated comedy of manners Barcelona. Jean Kennedy Smith, US Ambassador to Ireland, will perform the opening ceremony. Stillman first came to prominence in 1990 with the critically acclaimed Metropolitan. His new film marks a maturing of his directorial talents and signals his emergence as a major American film-maker. Whit Stillman himself will attend the screening in person.

On the subject of the new wave of talented non-Hollywood centred independent directors from the USA, there will also be a chance to see the latest release from the inimitable Hal Hartley, arguably the most talented of all the American newcomers and certainly one of the most imaginative and innovative authors in world cinema at the moment. Cork are showcasing his new picture Amateur, the profile of which is even higher due to the presence of the famous French actress Isabelle Huppert. As it happened, Huppert is such a fan of Hartley’s films that she herself contacted the director for the role in Amateur and accepted it for considerably less than her usual fee. The film also stars Hartley regular Martin Donavan.

Irish cinema is always high on the programming agenda at Cork. One of the lively highlights is Ailsa, the first feature by Paddy Breathnach, who was the winner of the Best Irish Short Film Award for his previous A Stone Of The Heart at the 1991 Cork Film Festival.

Ailsa is an atmospheric psychodrama set in contemporary Dublin and stars Brendan Coyle, Andrea Irving and Blanaid Irvine. The photography is by Cian de Buitléar and the film is edited by James E. Dalton, who also worked for Breathnach on his “socumentary” about the Republic of Ireland’s Road To America. Breathnach’s return to Cork – a kind of thank you to the Leeside Festival organisers for first giving him the chance to experience the big festival atmosphere – is typical of the reaction of film-makers to Cork Film Festival.

Also of very strong Irish interest is Out Of Ireland. Written and directed by Paul Wagner, the Oscar winning documentary film-maker from the U.S.A., his film traces the story of Irish emigration to America. It’s narrated by Kelly McGillis, with voice-overs by Irish actors Liam Neeson, Gabriel Byrne and Brenda Fricker. Needless to say the emigration saga has been a long and emotional one which is still relevant nowadays and Out Of Ireland attempts to put the current migrations in a historical context.

This year the organisers are setting up a liaison between Media Desk, the Cork Film Festival and the Management and Marketing Department of University College Cork under the umbrella of a ‘futures seminar’ entitled “Reflections on the Irish Film Industry: The Need For Strategic Repositioning?” The seminar will feature workshops and lectures from David Puttnam and Rod Stoneman, CEO of Bord Scannán na hÉireann, among others. It will be chaired by James Mitchell, executive producer of Littlebird Ltd.

The goal of the day-long event is to identify and discuss the various changes that are impacting on the film industry and to explore the possibility of a coherent integrated strategy which will bring the sector into the next century. It’s a must for anyone involved, or who would like to be involved, in any aspect of film-making in Ireland at present.

For those who like to sit back and enjoy the fruits of the toil of others and simply watch films, there’s still a dazzling array of art-house movies to suit a broad variety of tastes. The Sexual Life Of The Belgians, an hilarious account of the first twenty-eight years in the life of a working-class Flemish kid by Belgian enfant terrible Jan Bucquoy, curator of the Belgian Academy Of Underpants and convicted anarchist, should go some way towards undermining the notion that nothing of interest ever happens in Belgium. Another bright spot is Grosse Fatigue directed by the star of Monsieur Hire, Michel Blanc, who also stars in his own film. Grosse Fatigue is a verité-style comedy about the pitfalls of stardom and is a mixture of Kafka meets Robert Altman’s The Player with a vertiginous cast that includes Carole Bouquet of Chanel fame, Philipe Noiret and Roman Polanski as themselves.

Cork introduced the first and only Lesbian and Gay Film Festival in Ireland about four years ago. Unlike The Last Temptation Of Christ it has passed off without a hitch, fully redeeming Cork’s reputation as a pluralist community. True to the festival’s commitment to all that is conventionally marginalised, the crossover hit of the year Go Fish is featured. It has been variously described as a low-budget lesbian When Harry Met Sally and a love story for the 90’s. Either way, it is an auspicious debut by Rose Troche. Both she and the executive producer of the film Christine Vachon will both attend the screening, and Vachon will also participate in “Reflections on the Irish Film Industry’” on Friday 7th.

As the home of such extraordinary musical eccentrics as The Sultans of Ping and Fatima Mansions it’s no surprise that those Cork Film Festival pictures which are inspired by music are of an extremely intriguing and provocative – not too mention erudite! – nature. To begin with, Isaac Julien (Young Soul Rebels) steps into documentary territory with The Darker Side Of Black. Julien dwells pertinently on the anti-gay strain in black music which at times has gone as far as suggesting crucifixion and/or extermination for gays. In spite of the heavy diet of facts in The Darker Side Of Black however, the style of the direction takes the film beyond the constraints of investigative journalism.

Still on the musical side of the festival there’s an experimental biography of legendary jazzman Miles Davis which combines animation, collage and painting and is called Miles, So What! The directorial debut of the former Eurythmics man Dave Stewart, Taking Liberties With Mr Simpson is also worth checking out even if you were never a fan of the group’s music. Another which should grab people’s imagination is Speed Racer: Welcome To The World Of Vic Chesnutt, a half-an-hour of live performance and interview that features the wheelchaired yet harrowing Chesnutt and his Svengali, REM’s Michael Stipe.

Staying with music Live With This – Adrift In America , a road feature with a slacker mentality, is set to do for the ‘Nineties what Spinal Tap did for the ’80s. Director Brad Vanderberg travelled with indie pop band Popdefect on and off for three years as they hit the road in a broken down van and roamed aimlessly around the American Mid West, playing in every beer palace and dancehall that would tolerate their inimitable brand of punkadelic surf trash. The band and director encounter all kinds of weirdoes on their journey. (Why didn’t they just come to the Hot Press office? – Ed) In this witty, off-the-cuff movie, the eternal road looks more like a lost highway as this rockumentary – if you will – develops a resonance way beyond its subject matter. A sense of humour is required to appreciate the pearls of wisdom this labour of love distils.

The Cork Film Festival is committed to the documentary art form. Besides also including the experimental Thirty-Two Short Films About Glenn Gould, there is a special ‘Focus On’ section at the Triskel Arts Centre. This will consist of a retrospective on the work of documentary film-maker Nick Broomfield, the man who made that documentary last year about Lady Thatcher. Broomfield will attend the screenings. Some of his films featured are Aileen Wournos, Chicken Ranch, Juvenile Liaison and The Leader, His Driver And The Driver’s Wife. (No prizes for guessing where that last title came from!)

Cork Film Festival differs from its counterparts primarily in the way that it concentrates on filmmakers and films which might well not be seen anywhere else. Whereas, for example, the Dublin Film Festival usually showcases premiers of films from reasonably established directors that will go on to be quite big, the Cork Film Festival invariably tends to feature more debutante work from new directors. On top of this, there’s an emphasis in Cork on screening the widest selection of contemporary international cinema.

The programme is art house but, as can be seen, for all of that it’s not a limited interest menu. The Cork Opera House seats a thousand people. Last year the festival filled every seat for the eight-thirty evening slot with films, the majority of which did not subsequently get a commercial release. This phenomenon does rather beg the question as to just what the criteria are for commercial release. Nonetheless, Cork feels that it pushes cinemas into paying at least token heed to the more neglected but better independent directors out there in the film world.

The closing film of this year’s Cork Film Festival is the winner of the Grand Jury Prize at Cannes earlier this year, To Live from Zhang Yimou, director of Raise The Red Lantern. As seems to be the fashion for artistic exports from China these days, the film is an epic family saga spread over thirty tumultuous years in Chinese history. It was shipped out of China just before the introduction of stringent new censorship laws that would surely have caused it to have been banned by the authorities. In many ways the success of To Live mirrors the success and continued survival of the Cork Film Festival since its embryonic yearnings way back in 1956, and its progressive leanings ever since.

As it heads for the “big four oh”, rather than a mid-life crisis it looks as if the Cork Film Festival is on the crest of a young middle-aged boom. Like Zhang Yimou’s film To Live, Cork is in the enviable position of being able to be a commercial success while engaged in genre cinema of the highest quality. A couple of years ago they opened the festival with a premier screening of Neil Jordan’s The Crying Game. In anticipation of the audience’s reaction Jordan, who, naturally, was present in Cork, was very nervous. Of course, the audience loved it and Jordan was a very happy man that night. The rest, as they say, is history.

The Crying Game was a resounding success both artistically and commercially. Now, every year people ask what’s The Crying Game this time? There might not always be another Crying Game around the corner but there can be little doubt that with the likes of the Cork Film Festival around the ‘quality movies’ are obviously in very good hands indeed.

Long may Cork continue to unveil to us the otherwise buried treasures of world cinema . . .