PATRICK MCCORMACK is a poet, philosopher, and farmer. He is also the owner of ‘Fr Ted’s House’ in the Burren, County Clare, and is the subject of a film, which ponders a disappearing way of life, and our connections to the natural world.
The Silver Branch, directed by Katrina Costello, will be screened in the Town Hall Theatre on Wednesday October 3 at 8pm. A feature documentary, it is a meditation on nature, landscape, agrarian culture, a search for ‘unity of being’, the clash between idealism and reality, and the battle between preservation and construction - as seen through the eyes, and the poetry, of Patrick McCormack.
The Silver Branch Trailer from Sea Fever on Vimeo.
The film, directed by Katrina Costello, has been called "breathtakingly lovely" and "a character study of a remarkable man," by Donald Clarke of The Irish Times. "Patrick McCormack has, like generations of antecedents before him, worked a patch of land that rubs against the beautiful, austere Burren," Clarke wrote. "Costello’s rich images offer elegant underscores to the subject’s pastoral verse...The film gains a different momentum when McCormack gets drawn into the campaign against the controversial Burren Interpretive Centre. The film does trust that we share its subject’s passion for nature, but it will win over even those agnostic about the philosophy.”
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The Irish Film Review said it should be seen "for the imagery of the Burren and its wildlife alone", adding "McCormack’s poetry and the story give another context to the images; guiding us from meditative appreciation to solemn awareness of the place’s vulnerability."
The Silver Branch originally premiered at the 2017 Galway Film Fleadh. It was also been selected for screening at a number of international film festivals ithis year, including the prestigious Hot Docs festival in North America, where it received the Audience award.
For more information and tickets contact the Town Hall Theatre (091 - 569777, www.tht.ie ).
