Taking place on 30th - 31st January at Griffith College Dublin, the Imbolg Women Who Terrify Film Festival celebrates women who terrify, both on screen and behind the camera. In today's podcast we catch up four of the wonderful filmmakers whose work is screening at the festival.
- Marjo Viitala, I Remember You - Strand A
- Margaret Kane-Rowe, ShadowFable - Strand A
- Nadia Moosa, In the Season Thereof - Strand C
- Vanessa Gildea, on leaving you - Strand C
Listen now on SoundCloud, Apple, Spotify, Acast and Amazon, or subscribe to Film Ireland wherever you get your podcasts.
As winter draws to a close, this coven of creatives and connoisseurs will gather to mark the Celtic festival of Imbolg. In partnership with Film Ireland and Griffith College, join us for this jam-packed line up!
The programme features Women Who Terrify Shorts (Strands A, B and C), alongside the Goth Film Club: Irish Network for Gothic and Horror Studies talk on horror film selection, appreciation and critique. Also included are Faoin Talamh (AV Experience), In Conversation with Filmmaker Laura Moss, and a screening of birth / rebirth, introduced by director and co-writer Laura Moss.
Marjo Viitala, I Remember You
A group of young friends arrives at a secluded beach for a weekend of camping. As night falls, strange events unsettle them. When a local man vanishes, they become suspects, questioned by authorities who believe they know more than they admit. But is the true darkness lurking in the shadows… or within?
Marjo Viitala is a film director and media artist with an MA in Film from the Stockholm Academy of Dramatic Arts. She creates both narrative drama and conceptual art, with her films screening at festivals worldwide and her media works exhibited internationally. She also holds an M.Sc. in Engineering and Management from Aalto University and has worked at CERN and Nokia. Viitala lives and works in Helsinki, Finland. Fun fact: She once played in the Finnish Champion League in football.
Margaret Kane-Rowe, ShadowFable
Not all who wander are lost, some are damned. A young woman wanders into a supernatural realm where evil feeds on fear.
Margaret Kane-Rowe has a level 9 PG Certificate (with distinction) from Trinity College Dublin, in Cultural and Creative Entrepreneurship. She is an award-winning scriptwriter and director winning The Nantucket Film Festival, Tony Cox, Showtime Channel, Scriptwriting Award, 2018, where Margaret was mentored by Oscar nominated director, Noah Baumbach. She won best Debut director at the Dublin International Comedy Film Festival 2020 with her first short film Duck Egg Blue. And Best Short Comedy at the Dublin Independent Film Festival in 2021 for Duck Egg Blue. Her short film Mask was produced in July 2022 and premiered at the London Irish Film Festival in November 2022. Mask won Best International Narrative Short at Focus Wales Film Festival 2023 and was a nominated finalist for Best International Short at the BIFA qualifying Barnes Film Festival London 2023, and winner of Best Director at the Oxford Shorts International Film Festival 2023.
Nadia Moosa, In the Season Thereof
Thrown into a new town senior year, Mark has left Utah, the Mormon Church, and a two-parent household. He quickly falls for a local girl, but as religious guilt and obsession consume him, he's left with nothing but a lingering citrus stench.
Nadia Moosa is currently a sophomore at Wesleyan University studying film and government. She's from Long Island, NY and is excited to have created her first short film. She's passionate about screenwriting and hopes to work on more projects in the future.
Vanessa Gildea, on leaving you
on leaving you is a personal experimental short film that examines the cyclical nature of departure and memory, of death and rebirth and personal complicity in the horror of living, suggesting that what we attempt to leave behind inevitably reappears in the places we arrive
Vanessa Gildea is an award winning Filmmaker and Lecturer in Film + Television at the National Film School, IADT. A former Head of Department Film + Media and The National Film School, she holds an MA Screenwriting (1st class hons) and is currently studying the Creative Futures Academy Level 9 Cert in Radio & Podcast Production from the NFS IADT, and holds a BA in Media & Communications and English from the University of Limerick. She has worked since 2008 as a Lecturer in Film and at the NFS IADT since 2013, working across disciplines such as Documentary, Scriptwriting, Production, Direction and also the History of TV Drama and Digital Storytelling in the Dept. of Humanities at IADT.
Vanessa has received five IFTA (Irish Academy) nominations including as writer / director of The White Dress, as producer in the Feature Documentary category for Dambé – The Mali Project , John Ford – Dreaming the Quiet Man, as Producer / Director of The 34th – A history of Marriage Equality in Ireland and as part of the team that made the IFTA winning 1916 The Irish Rebellion narrated by Liam Neeson. She is a former Vice-Chair and board member of Women in Film & TV Ireland, and co-founder and documentary programmer of the Catalyst International Film Festival that celebrates diversity in the film industry.
Vanessa’s credits as writer / director include I AM IRELAND - an art dance commission film for Culture Night and RTÉ Arts & Culture 2020. The Lunch experimental short film recipient of the SDGI ARRI ALEXA TAKE Award. Feature documentary The 34th - (Netflix). The Arts Council Project Award film and multi award winning The Abandoning, Keeping the Beast at Bay – a short documentary made for Venom Films. The documentary O Béal go Bhéal um Nollaig for RTÉ, and the drama The White Dress, winner of numerous best short film festival awards and an IFTA nomination. Vanessa was the first recipient of the Tyrone Guthrie Film Bursary award and has received two Arts Council Film Bursaries & an Arts Council Film Project Award. She has worked freelance as a producer and director with a variety of companies including Loopline Film, COCO TV, Harvest Films and RTÉ Arts & Culture.
Vanessa’s industry experience spans 25 years and has offered her the opportunity to travel the world both in production and exhibition. She has filmed in locations as diverse as the Sahara Desert, Germany, Gibraltar, France, Spain, New York, California and Timbuktu. This experience has offered her the opportunity to film and work with great stalwarts of the industry including Martin Scorsese, Maureen O’Hara, Albert Maysles, Peter Bogdanovich, Jimmy Murakami, John Boorman, Gabriel Byrne, and Dearbhla Walsh. Her work has screened at festivals worldwide and at MoMa, New York. Vanessa’s experimental film practice increasingly focuses on building soundscapes for her work from scratch . She harbours unrealistic dreams of being a Foley Artist.
Griffith College
Griffith College Dublin, one of Ireland’s leading independent third-level institutions, is proud to host Imbolg: Women Who Terrify Film Festival on its Dublin campus. With a strong focus on film, media, journalism, design and creative practice, Griffith College supports emerging and established voices through industry-led education, live events and community partnerships. Learn more about Griffith College’s full-time and part-time creative courses at griffith.ie
