THE 2010 IFTA BEST FILM NOMINATIONS WERE A FIX!

Anyone who has a passing interest in Irish cinema would have heard of the IFTAs. The Irish Film (and) Television Awards. They nominate the best Irish films from the previous year and select the premier one. That is in theory what happens but in reality it's a bit diffferent.

This year there were five films nominated. The only problem was that no-one had actually seen these titles at the time of the televised award ceremony. Except the animated Secret of Kells which was released in cinemas the previous year. The excuse was that films screened at the festivals were eligible to be nominated. Why was this rule? Maybe because there would not be enough films to receive nominations? The problem was there were enough Irish films released in 2009 to be eligible. Here is a list of eligible titles: W.C., Helen, Wide open spaces, A film with me in it, Situations vacant, Happy ever afters, 8.5 hours. Yes, I know they were mostly rubbish but that's not the point. They were all released in cinemas during the previous twelve months before the 2010 IFTA awards. The nominated films that had not yet got a commercial release were: Eclipse, Ondine, Eamon, Zonad. Let's take each film individually. The Eclipse is a TV movie so it really should have been nominated in the television section. Ondine is one of Neil Jordan's worst movies in years. In fact it's derivative of several other Irish movies. Eamon is a little disaster of a movie that fails more than it succeeds. Finally Zonad is THE WORST PIECE OF SH*T IRISH MOVIE IN YEARS! Why did these films get nominated then. Two reasons. Firstly you have to pay money to get your 'masterpiece' nominated. That might explain why the smaller Irish films from last year didn't receive nominations because it would have been too expensive. Or else not many were aware of these titles because of the low publicity campaigns? The second reason that the above films received Best Film nominations is because the IFTAs are a fix! That's right a fix. Even worse than the fix you would get from buying plant food in your local headshop. Why are the IFTAs a fix? Because they are being used to publicise these new movies that's why. The only reason that Zonad crap got nominated was because it was from the director of Once. That's how it works. Once you're established in this country you can do no wrong. That's why Ondine received a nomination. Because everything its director does is great. That's why Eamon received a nomination. Because it's from a scheme (Catalyst) that has received more publicity in this country than any of last year's Irish releases. That's why The Eclipse got nominated. Because it's from a distinguised playwright who had previously directed two rubbish features but because he's 'respected' his new film receives a nomination. Then because the other nominated films are not that good his feature wins - so now you know! The IFTAs have to be told what to nominate because they don't care about smaller Irish films. They are afraid to take a risk. That is why Once won an award at Sundance but didn't receive an IFTA Best Film nomination! So what title should have won the 2010 Best Film IFTA? I'll tell you - Helen. Why? Because it's more cinematic than any of the five nominated titles. It's made by people who know their stuff about cinema. It's as far away from a TV movie as possible. Sure, it wasn't a masterpiece but it's the smaller films like Helen that need to win these awards to gain publicity and recognition for their filmmakers.