Walsh's 'Chatroom' To Be Filmed By Hideo Nakata

Hideo Nakata, the director of 'Ringu', 'The Ring Two' and 'Dark Water', is being lined up to bring Irish writer Enda Walsh's play 'Chatroom' to the big screen. The film will mark Nakata's first original directing effort in the English language.

Walsh is one to watch. His plays are consistently ambitious from his debut Disco Pigs, which he adapted into a film directed by Kirsten Sheridan to more recent efforts like the brilliant Walworth Farce. To add extra fire to his hot streak, he recently co-wrote the screenplay for the Cannes Camera d’Or winning 'Hunger' (see what we think of that in our reviews section). Walsh himself has adapted the script for the psychological thriller about teenagers who urge each other to engage in destructive behaviour. This sounds like every teenager we know but I'm sure Walsh has found something interesting to do.

Hunger Review

Check out our review of award-hoovering debut of director Steve McQueen. The review of Hunger is up in our reviews section here

'Eden' Gets American Release

Good news for Irish Film. Eden has secured a release in the U.S.A. Eugene O'Brien has adapated his own hit stage play and Declan Recks directs. We caught this in the Dublin International Film Festival and were seriously impressed. It's particularly notable that it has managed to travel, given how there is almost no hook and no unique selling point. It's simply about a couple having relationship difficulties in Ireland. That's it.

As with any story, though, it's all in the telling. Check it out ASAP.

'I Sell The Dead' Isn't Getting The Hard Sell

For some reason this movie is slipping under the radar in Ireland (and pretty much everywhere else). OTo be fair, it hasn't been released yet but scarcely a word has been said about it, while any other minor Irish achievement gets guaranteed column inches and air time. It's called I Sell the Dead, it's a stylish horror comedy and it stars a hobbit and Hellboy! Okay it stars Ron Perlman and Dominic Monaghan but close enough. The main point to note is that it was written and directed by Irishman, Glen McQuaid.

McQuaid is a digital FX and compositing specialist who made a number of notable shorts before landing funding for this, his feature debut. Now we know there are Irish people like John Moore who have broken Hollywood via the world of commercials and are making a successful living as directors (or in some cases writers for hire) and there are some who enjoy success with Irish made films that allow them to take on Hollywood projects (Sheridan, Jordan et al) but McQuaid seems to be one of the first Irishmen to go straight to Hollywood with his own project and direct it himself.

It looks inventive and original, which is a nice way of saying it will be either bold and brilliant or awful and embarrassing. Let's hope it gets proper backing and a serious release in America either way.

One acknowledgement: We say Hollywood, but we realise this is more of an independent picture and was apparently primarily made out of New York but we mean Hollywood in the general sense of that abstract world where the magic happens, cocaine flows like water and dead hookers are never a problem, as opposed to the world of Irish film where even a hot lunch for the crew is a problem.