Filmmakers Robert Higgins and Patrick McGivney introduce their award-winning debut feature Lakelands, ahead of its Irish TV premiere on RTÉ One on Saturday, October 25th.
The idea for Lakelands very much had its roots in our days growing up playing Gaelic football for our local club in our hometown of Granard. We first met at football training sometime around U10s and went on to play up through the age groups. We hung around in the same group of friends and always had a love of film, but you could say we took the somewhat scenic route into filmmaking.
After years of working corporate jobs in Dublin, we began writing scripts together in the evenings and eventually the talk turned to trying our hand at bringing these stories to life.
After some failed attempts in the bogs and back lanes of north Longford, we managed to make a couple of shorts that attracted some attention. We were lucky enough to work with Paul Mescal just after Normal People on a short film called Drifting. The film was quite autobiographical, and we felt we had tapped into a rich vein of material with it. It was received well on the festival circuit and it gave us confidence that there was an opportunity to explore a feature project set where we grew up.
From there, we began working on the Lakelands script, mining our own experiences and focusing on the generational issues we were noticing in our own friend group, specifically emigration and its effects on those who leave and those who stay.
The GAA is part of the fabric of every small town and village in Ireland, but had never a full exploration in film. With Lakelands we felt that there was an opportunity to explore something that had been a massive part of our lives and our identity to that point. At the same time, Rob was taking part in the Advanced Producing Course, and we began to look for avenues to bring the project to life. Chris Higgins and Andrei Bogdan also came on as co-producers around this time.
We got some early backers in Creative Ireland and Longford Arts Office and winning the Bankside Award at the Galway Film Market gave us the boost we needed to move the project forward.
We were fortunate to cast some very talented lead actors in Éanna Hardwicke and Danielle Galligan, who we had seen in and been blown away by in various theatre productions around Dublin. Thanks to the Backstage Theatre’s Activate Bursary, we were able to bring them down to Longford for a couple of days where we brought them around to our old haunts and filled them in on some of the stories that had inspired the material. Both of them are incredibly creative and brought so much of themselves to their performances.
The shoot took place over 17 days in November, where we were mercifully spared any rain for the entirety of the shoot. We had a tight schedule, but thanks to an incredible crew and immense support from our local community we were able to complete the shoot on time. Wildcard Distribution and Screen Ireland came on board around then and we were into the edit suite.
but you could say we took the somewhat scenic route into filmmaking.'
We premiered at the Galway Film Fleadh that summer where we were fortunate enough to win the Best Irish Film and Éanna and Danielle won the Bingham Ray New Talent award. The film went on to win awards at the Dublin Film Critics Circle and Kerry Festival and was nominated for 4 IFTAs. For us, the film is distillation of a moment of time in our lives in our late twenties and we’re delighted to be broadcasting it for the first time on RTÉ One this Saturday.
Lakelands, RTÉ One, Saturday, October 25th at 9.40 pm
