JDIFF09: EAMON

It was a packed house for the world premiere of this new Irish feature film from acclaimed short filmmaker Margaret Corkery, which tells the story of a hyperactive young boy, his selfish mother and her current boyfriend.

The lead peformances are all terrific and the film is a visual delight but it doesn't really feel like a finished product to me. The Q&A mentioned afterwards that it was the result of the Catalyst Project and that the script began with a workshop and was banged out in 20 days. Unfortunately it could probably have done with significantly more time being polished.

It feels like an easy criticism to make of a feature film from a predominantly shorts-based director, but the film really does look like a short film expanded to feature length. There's a lot of time spent emphasising the problems of each character and not enough getting the story moving. In short, we end up with a film that spends too much time getting to its destination and not enough time when it gets there.

Like HELEN, which I saw in Edinburgh and is playing in Dublin this week, the film leaves me in no doubt that the director is a major talent when directing but really needs a better script. The film feels, in both story and visual terms, like EDEN and RATCATCHER but never quite strikes the same balance of arty direction and solid script.

It's a very promising first feature but not without its flaws.