The St Brigid's Film Festival returns for 2020, showcasing some of the finest work of Irish women filmmakers, from tender, compelling personal animated stories to moving international drama.
Female directors, producers and writers are responsible for some of the country's finest film and TV offerings, and have helped chart, cinematically, the cultural and societal changes that have created the modern, progressive Ireland of today.
The festival's main feature, screening Sunday 2nd February at 7.30pm, is the London Premiere of A Girl from Mogadishu, a powerful drama based on the true story of global FGM (Female Genital Mutilation) activist and proud Irish citizen Ifrah Ahmed.
The film stars Aja Naomi King (How to Get Away with Murder, Birth of a Nation) as Ifrah, who, in 2006 was trafficked to Ireland while trying to flee war-torn Somalia. During her application process for refugee status, a medical examination revealed her to be a victim of childhood FGM. This practice was relatively unknown to Irish doctors at the time, and so Ifrah found herself having to explain.
The film's writer and director Mary McGuckian will attend a post-screening Q&A, joined by Bonnie Greer, and hosted by acclaimed activist, filmmaker and writer Dr. Leyla Hussein OBE.
Further highlights include Who's the Daddy? directed by Mary-Sue Masson and produced by Clancie Brennan, Carol Freeman's The Bird and the Whale, and The Girl at the End of the Garden, directed by Bonnie Dempsey. Other films will be announced in the coming week.
