Certainly minor news, this here update, and none that shocking considering Neil Jordan (above) is from the country to begin with. But word out of THR today has it that Jordan’s new vampire film, BYZANTIUM, has just secured funding from the Irish Film Board (IFB). What this means? Jordan will likely shoot the bulk of his picture in Ireland, Dublin and Wicklow specifically…with largely an Irish crew. Should definitely make for a Gothic, old-world visual ambience.
Set to star Sam Riley, Saoirse Ronan, Gemma Arterton (below), Daniel Mays, Uri Gavriel, Jeff Mash and Caleb Landry Jones – BYZANTIUM picks up as:
Two young women arrive in a nameless British small town. Their names are not their own. They don’t declare their ages. Their relationship with each other is not clear. Are they sisters, as their assumed identities declare? Or are they mother and daughter? The eldest, Claire, takes a job in a pub. The youngest, Eleanor, goes to school.
During a truth exercise in her drama class, Eleanor confesses that she has been alive for over two hundred years and has survived by drinking human blood. Her classmates think she is utterly crazy and Mint, her teacher, puts her in touch with the school counsellor. She makes one friend, Frank, a boy who has been home educated and is as much of an oddity as Eleanor. He tries to get to the bottom of her vampire delusion, thinking it an epic and compelling psychosis. Why would anyone want to be undead?
Given that synopsis, how do you like the idea of the story being set in Ireland?