I am pleased to welcome you to the Irish Film
Festival in Moscow. The Festival is a fine
celebration of Irish cinema and introduces some
our most talented filmmakers to a Russian
audience.
The organisers, Gerard Michael MacCarthy and
Johnny O'Reilly, have chosen a selection of
Ireland's most recent feature films, as well as
widely known Irish classics, which I hope you
will enjoy.
Irish cinema has undergone a long process of
evolution since the first Irish films of the
early 20th century, and this process has
resulted in the rich variety of films on offer
to Moscow cinephiles over the weekend. The
oldest film, 'The Field', which was released in
1990, was one of the first films to mark the
beginning of this new, outward-looking modern
Irish cinema, and its influence can be seen in
the most recent film, 'Once', which was made in
2007, and reflects a modern, cosmopolitan Irish
reality. |
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I hope that the Irish Film Festival will deepen
cultural relations between Ireland and Russia,
which have been developing from strength to
strength, and become a regular event on the
Moscow cultural calendar.
I take this opportunity to thank everyone
involved in the Festival, Culture Ireland and
Reel Ireland, and the sponsors of the event. I
wish to especially thank you for coming to see
Irish cinema. I hope you enjoy the films.
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Justin Harman,
Ambassador of Ireland to Russia. |
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