On the Batter

Tanya Sweeney talks to director Lance Daly about his latest film The Halo Effect, starring Stephen Rea and Simon Delaney, set in a late-night Dublin chip shop.

The Halo Effect, which boasts a stellar cast (including Stephen Rea, Fiona O'Shaughnessy and Gerard McSorley) is a thoughtfully-shot and wonderfully-textured account of life at Fatso's – a run-down chip-shop on Dublin's Northside. A fine blend of finely-honed comedy and well-paced action is set to place the film alongside the likes of Inside I'm Dancing and Man About Dog as one of the most endearing Irish films of recent times.

When you think of Ireland's current crop of hotshot directors, the name Lance Daly might not be on the tip of every cinemagoer's tongue. With the imminent release of The Halo Effect, that is about to change. As the film's writer and producer, as well as collaborating on the film's soundtrack, Daly appears poised to capitalise on the moderate success that his debut feature, Last Days in Dublin, afforded him.

Tanya: How did the script for The Halo Effect come about?

Lance: I wrote the script during a time when I was working by night so I could finish Last Days in Dublin by day. I was delivering for a pizza place and Chinese takeaway amongst other things – random cash jobs – where I kept finding myself in the middle of completely ridiculous situations with the kind of angry drunks and local eccentrics that only come out after midnight. It struck me as such a strange choice for someone to want to actually own one of these places and deal with this week in week out – how could you put yourself through that? So I started thinking about that question, and keeping a record of all the madness that happened on the job, and it all mixed with my own personal nonsense into the big stew which became the script. The other reason it seemed a worthwhile proposition as a second film was that whatever the next project was, I knew it would be another tight budget, and this seemed to be a workable concept – one central location, all happening within the city, all Irish characters, etc.

The full article is printed in Film Ireland 101