Ireland, 1984
Director: Pat Murphy; screenplay: Pat Murphy; cinematography: Thaddeus O’Sullivan; production design: Tamara Conboy; costumes: Consolata Boyle; editing: Arthur Keating; music: Robert Boyle; producers: Pat Murphy, Tom Hayes; production company: Aeon Films Production. Irish location: Co. Roscommon, Co. Dublin
Running time: 121’
With Brid Brennan, Bosco Hogan, Des McAleer, Gillian Hackett, David Kelly, Ian McElhinney
SYNOPSIS
Based on the life of the neglected historical figure Anne Devlin, who worked with Robert Emmett in the planning of the abortive rising of 1803. Subsequently she was arrested and tortured but refused to name the conspirators. She was held in solitary confinement for three years in Kilmainham Gaol and her entire family were also imprisoned, seven of them died in captivity before her own release due to illness.
DIRECTOR
Born in Dublin, Pat Murphy is a filmmaker who works across a range of practices. After graduating in Fine Art, she received an MA in Film and Television and won a scholarship to attend the Whitney Museum Independent Study Programme in New York.
She made her first short film, Rituals of Memory in 1977, establishing with this an interest in exploring women’s histories and alternative models of representation. She directed three features: Maeve (1981, co-directed with John Davies), Anne Devlin, completed in 1984, and Nora, an international co-production starring Ewan McGregor and Susan Lynch, released in 2000. A founder Board Member of FILM BASE and the Screen Directors Guild of Ireland, Pat Murphy is also a member of Aosdána, an autonomous affiliation of artists, established by the government in 1981 to honour artists whose work had made an outstanding contribution to the creative arts in Ireland.