Pomona Rewind

During a visit to the Foyle Film Festival eight years ago, Belfast-born film critic Mark Cousins remarked Irish cinema was a cottage industry. Be that as it may, Terry George's recent Best Short Film Oscar success with 'The Shore' once again illustrated how filmmakers on both sides of the border can make their mark internationally with Irish and Ulster based stories. So what are the best films made about Ireland by Irish born directors? These are 10 St Patrick's Day picks. Feel free to quibble but remember we are talking about movies about Ireland, north and south, by Irish directors. ANGEL (1982) As film debuts go, they do not come more exhilarating than Neil Jordan's first foray into filmmaking. One of the first crop of Film on Four movies, 'Angel' is an atmospheric revenge thriller set along the border which uses the Troubles as a backdrop. Stephen Rea plays Danny, a showband saxophonist who is traumatised after witnessing the exec

It is very easy to dismiss teenagers as being image obsessed, social media hounds. Anyone with a bit of sense knows there are plenty of socially aware teens who care about society. In recentvtimes, a spate of films have proven teenagers who are just as engaged as adults about important social and political issues and do not hide behind smartphones or tablets. Stephen Chbosky's 'The Perks of Being A Wallflower' tackled the difficult issue of child abuse in 2012 within the confines of a smart, well acted, relatable teen drama. Josh Boone's romantic drama 'The Fault In Our Stars' also scored a huge hit in 2014 tackling the tough topic of teenage cancer. Greg Berlanti's 'Love, Simon' broke new ground last year as a teen romantic comedy with a gay lead character in what has been seen as a big leap forward for the depiction of LGBT characters onscreen. 2018 saw another huge leap for teenage cinema. George Tillman Jr's 'The Hate

OK. So it's been almost four weeks. However just in case you started to think I'd gone for a Burton, I'm back to tell you I've gone to a Burton. Tim Burton's ' Dark Shadows ' is a typically campy comedy from the director of 'Batman', ' Beetlejuice ' and 'Sleepy Hollow' focussing on families, death and vampire immortality. Based on an obscure daytime American soap opera about vampires in New England, it reunites the gothic moviemaker with his favourite muse, Johnny Depp and is very much a labour of love for both the director and his star. It was first mooted when they were shooting 'Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street' and, no doubt, on paper it appeared to have all the ingredients of a classic Burton and Depp collaboration - an eccentric central character, other oddball characters, goofball humour. The movie begins in the urine stenched port of 1760's Liverpool which Depp's character, Barnaba

Last year, Steven Spielberg gave us two of the most unlikely 'edge of your seat' moments in cinema. Not only did ' War Horse ' make ploughing a field nailbiting but he also gave us a surprisingly thrilling auction sequence in a village square in Devon between Peter Mullan and David Thewlis. Spielberg's latest movie 'Lincoln' is interested in horse trading of a different kind - the horse trading between American Presidents and Congress to pass crucial legislation. It is no accident that 'Lincoln' has arrived in cinemas as President Obama begins a second term in the White House, after a difficult and bruising first term battle with Republicans in Congress. Much has already been written about the divided nation presided over by America's first black President and the one led by Honest Abe. Spielberg's very public support for Barack Obama, including a $1 million donation to his re-election campaign, has added further fuel to that de

In the last year, there's been a bit of pop culture debate about the emergence of the "woman child". Like the "man child", the "woman child" is purported to be someone who is normally in their late 20s or early 30s but still living out their teenage years. The phenomenon of the "woman child" was fuelled last September by an article for the website  Jezebel  by  Deborah Schoeneman, one of the writers of the acclaimed HBO comedy 'Girls', who observed  that a generation of single women  "seem to be acting and dressing like girls more than ever". "Woman children", she claimed, prolong their girlhood by prioritising their friendship with other "women children" over relationships with men. They act as if they are still part of a high school clique, while some of their peers embrace motherhood or careers. They post up on Facebook pictures of their holidays or boozy nights out with the g