Bandit Films has published the programme for the 13th Adaptation Festival that is running from Septemeber 16-20.

Oscar-winning director Volker Schlöndorff and author Colm Tóibín are among the participants at this year’s festival which takes place at the Model Cinema, Sligo and venues in Manorhamilton.

In addition to a new and distinctly European flavour to this year’s festival, there is also a strong local focus. Samanta Nobody, from director Ciarán Creagh and Strandhill producer Niall Flynn, was filmed in many locations in Sligo, including in and about the renowned Record Room. With a cast headed by Ruby Jean Lennon in the title role, Brendan Conroy and Maggie Hannon, the film features many recognisable faces from Sligo’s theatre and film world including Orla McSharry, Declan Drohan and Ciarán McCauley.

New films from filmmakers in the region figure prominently in the programme. Michéal Coughlan’s short Woodweb, combines the ecological and the supernatural. It features Deirdre Gaule and was filmed and edited by Ciarán Carty. Capall is an Irish language heist film which is directed by Glenn Gannon and produced by James Dennison for Sligo company Studiorove. It features Olga Wehrly in the female lead. These are among over ten short films from local talent screening at the festival.

There is a particular European theme to the festival’s feature film programme. Pat Murphy’s Nora, largely set and film in Trieste, Italy, explores the life of James Joyce and above all that of his wife Nora Barnacle and her influence on his writing. Hold onto Me is a warm father-daughter story from Cyprus which won the Audience Award at this year’s Sundance Film Festival.

At the heart of the festival’s feature film programme is the work of German director Volker Schlöndorff with five films selected from his sixty-year career, including Visitation which premiered at this year’s Cannes Film Festival. It tells the story of the occupants of a Berlin lakeside house over the span of a century. Commenting on his selection of the German director’s work as the main focus, festival director Johnny Gogan says: “whether it is his satirical take on the German police and “yellow” media in a film from 1975, The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum, or the challenge for a journalist in not taking sides in Lebanon’s 1980s civil war, as explored in Circle of Deceit, the stories and the themes remain both engaging and relevant decades later.”

The festival concludes at the Model Cinema with a public conversation between Colm Tóibín and Volker Schlöndorff, about their collaboration on Return to Montauk for which the Irish author wrote the screenplay. Colm Tóbín will then introduce Brooklyn, the film which he adapted (with Nick Hornby) from his celebrated novel.

Adaptation is organised by Bandit Films and Cinema North West in association with Sligo Film Society and the Glens Arts Centre and is supported by the Arts Council, Screen Ireland, Sligo and Leitrim County Councils. It forms part of both counties’ programme of cultural events to coincide with Ireland’s EU Presidency.

Full programme is available on https://cinemanorthwest.ie/