Good friends of Scannain Element Pictures have just sent over some great news. It seems that initial reaction to their forthcoming movie The Guard is fantastic after the movie received at its world premiere last night in Park City, Utah as part of the Sundance film festival.
The movie, which was selected as the opening film of the World Dramatic Competition at the festival, is directed by John Michael McDonagh, and has a cast featuring such talents as Brendan Gleeson, Don Cheadle, Fionnuala Flanagan, Liam Cunningham, and Mark Strong.
The Guard tells the story of Sergeant Gerry Boyle (Gleeson) is a small-town cop with a confrontational personality, a subversive sense of humour, a dying mother, a fondness for prostitutes, and absolutely no interest whatsoever in the international cocaine-smuggling ring that has brought FBI agent Wendell Everett (Cheadle)to his door. Suffice to say that it’s a drama, with a good dash of comedy.
The Los Angeles Times reported that film buyers flocked to the sold out screening “..like moths to a flame, making it a fitting festival launch”. While Variety is quoted as saying “… it’s Gleeson who rightly owns the screen as a beer-swilling, crotch-grabbing, Derringer-firing crusader with one hell of a filthy mouth to go along with his heart of gold.” and the director John Michael McDonagh’s “filmmaking crackles with energy”.
An Irish/UK co-production, The Guard is backed by the Irish Film Board and Section 481 as well as International Financiers. It’s produced by Chris Clark and Flora Fernandez Marengo for Reprisal Films and Ed Guiney and Andrew Lowe for Element Pictures.
We’ll all get a chance to witness what Hollywood has already started raving about when The Guard hits Irish screens this summer. Bualadh bos all round.