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Sales deal for Irish comedy ‘Damo & Ivor: The Movie’

The film, which started as a YouTube skit before getting picked up for two seasons by broadcaster RTÉ, is scheduled to open in theaters across Ireland on St. Patrick’s Day 2018. Before then, Damo & Ivor: The Movie will be screened at the American Film Market next week.

Blue Ink Films and Parallel Films are co-producing the film with Ruth Carter as producer and Johanna Hogan and Alan Moloney as executive producers.

Following the lives of identical twin brothers separated at birth, the film picks up their story just as they’re about to embark on a journey across Ireland in search of their long lost brother, John Joe.

CEO of Carnaby International, Andrew Loveday, said: “We are enormously excited to be bringing Damo & Ivor to market. Andy Quirke is an inspired comedic writer and this really translates on screen in this laugh-out-loud funny and heart-warming picture.”

In addition to Quirke, who plays both Damo and Ivor, the film also stars Ruth McCabe (Philomena), Tina Kellegher (In The Name Of The Father) and Simon Delaney (The Conjuring 2).

The film is supported by the Irish Film Board, RTÉ and the Broadcast Authority of Ireland.

Directors Ronan and Rob Burke commented: “Carnaby has been passionate about our film from the start and we are so excited to be working with them. We would love Damo & Ivor to reach as wide an audience as possible and Carnaby are the perfect company to make this happen.”

Carnaby previously handed 2016 Irish comedy The Young Offenders.

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Review: THE YOUNG OFFENDERS (Empire)

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” Raucously funny and winningly played, this is the best Irish comedy since Sing Street.”

★★★★★

Cork scallies Conor MacSweeney (Alex Murphy) and Jock Murphy (Chris Walley) cycle to the coast in search of a washed-up bale of cocaine, only to be pursued by a dogged Garda sergeant (Dominic MacHale) and a disabled drug dealer (PJ Gallagher) with a nail gun.

Only a handful of memorable movies have been filmed in County Cork, but writer-director Peter Foott’s debut deserves to be mentioned alongside John Huston’s Moby Dick, John Roberts’s War of the Buttons, Ken Loach’s The Wind That Shakes the Barley and Neil Jordan’s Ondine. Despite taking its cue from the 2007 seizure off the West Cork coast of a record €440m-worth of cocaine, this freewheeling tale also owes much to such comic pairings as Laurel and Hardy, Craggy Island clerics Ted and Dougal and Lenny Abrahamson’s Dublin wasters, Adam & Paul.

Bonding because everyone else thinks they’re eejits, 15 year-olds Alex Murphy and Chris Walley dream of living in a mansion with topless girls and an English butler. In reality, Walley steals bikes to ease the pain of being abused by drunken father Michael Sands, while Murphy trades insults with widowed mother Hilary Rose, who runs a market fish stall and considers Walley a bad influence on her impressionable son. She’s right to be concerned, as who else would think of cycling 100 miles to Three Castle Head on the off chance of finding a bale of coke washed up from a captured trawler?

Once Murphy and Walley have an idea in their heads, however, there’s no shifting it and Foott follows their misadventures with a wittily non-judgemental empathy, as encounters with sticky lollies and confused chickens preface more menacing confrontations with a jobsworthy cop, a clubfooted drug dealer and a neighbourhood thug. The dialogue is as sharp as Paddy Jordan’s views of the Munster countryside, while the young leads are well worth a re-teaming. But what most impresses is the way Foott nimbly exploits every seemingly insignificant detail in slotting together the hilariously convoluted plot.

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The Young Offenders Wins Three Awards at Largest US Comedy Festival

Ireland’s latest international hit movie keeps on racking up the honours in both the US and the UK.

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The smash-hit Irish comedy The Young Offenders picked up three awards at the LA Comedy Festival over the weekend. The film, which has been widely acclaimed, won prizes in the Best Feature Direction, Best Feature Screenplay and Best Feature Film categories at the American festival ,which is the largest comedy festival in the US featuring film, live comedy acts and a screenplay competition.

Lead actors Alex Murphy and Chris Walley were also presented with the ‘Ros Hubbard Award for Acting’ at the Irish Film Festival in London. The film also picked up the Súil Eile award at the festival last week.

Written and directed by Peter Foott The Young Offenders is the highest grossing Irish-made film of 2016 and is the fastest Irish film to break the €1million mark at the Irish Box Office this year.

The film continues to be distributed in territories around the world with Carnaby International, a UK film company specialising in worldwide sales, announcing this month that it has signed deals for the film in Germany (Studio Hamburg) and Former Yugoslavia (Discovery).

The comedy is set to screen at the Black Nights Film Festival in Estonia this weekend and will also screen at the Irish Film Festival London, this coming Saturday.

Inspired by Ireland’s biggest cocaine seizure of €440 million, off the coast of Cork in 2007, The Young Offenders follows two Cork inner-city teenagers, Conor and Jock, as they embark on a 160km road trip on stolen bikes in the hopes of finding an unrecovered bale of cocaine. It’s the debut feature from Foott and introduces new acting talent Chris Walley and Alex Murphy in the lead roles, with comedians Hilary Rose and PJ Gallagher also starring.

The Young Offenders continues to screen in Irish cinemas.

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“It wasn’t just funny, it was brilliant”: Carnaby’s Lorianne Hall on ‘The Young Offenders’

Having recently surpassed the €1M mark at the Irish box office, Peter Foott’s feature debut ‘The Young Offenders’ has gone on to garner international attention, including its recent acquisition by Carnaby International Sales & Distribution at AFM.
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Lorianne Hall of Carnaby talks to IFTN about the attraction of the hit Irish comedy and lovable pair Conor and Jock, portrayed by Chris Walley and Alex Murphy.

The UK-based company has acquired all international rights, excluding English-speaking countries, which have previously gone to XYZ. Other recent titles include Amanda Sharp’s comedy drama ‘Sticky Notes’ and Chris Foggin’s ‘Kids in Love.’

Lorianne Hall, Senior Manager, Sales and Acquisitions:
“Being a fan of Irish film, and Irish humour in particular, I was automatically drawn to the film. I was familiar with Peter’s show Republic of Telly and knew that the film would be funny but when I saw it, it wasn’t just funny, it was brilliant. I knew it was going to be a hit.

But what really impressed me and what I think makes it universal is the heart in the film and how subtly that was achieved. For example I think the ending of the film is just excellent and so moving but hilarious at the same time. Everyone knows a Conor or a Jock and has a soft spot for the lovable loser. No matter where you are or what language you speak their “holiday” adventure was sure to strike a cord with everyone.

Peter has such a light and honest touch with his story telling which allows people to really relate to this story and the characters. You laugh but also love the characters and their flaws. He tells human stories that are funny as, with warmth and kindness and I am sure he is going to have an amazing career ahead. It’s for all of those reason I wanted to be involved with this film and bring Peter’s talent and these two jokers to the rest of the world.”

Hall has over two decades of experience in the film and television industry, having previously worked with Warner Brothers, Shooting Stars Distribution and Scanbox Entertainment, to name a few.

She has previously been responsible for acquiring the ‘Taken’ franchise starring Liam Neeson, ‘The Place Beyond the Pines’ (Derek Cianfrance) and more recently ‘The Little Prince’ directed by Mark Osborne. In Ireland she has also consulted for Screen Training Ireland and the Irish Film Board.

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AFM: Irish box office hit ‘The Young Offenders’ secures int’l sales deal

Carnaby to launch sales on comedy which has grossed more than €1m in Ireland.

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Carnaby Sales and Distribution has acquired international sales rights to Irish comedy The Young Offenders.

The film has proven a box office hit in its local market, taking €1m for Wildcard Distribution. Vertigo recently snapped the film up for UK, US and Australia/NZ.

Inspired by the true story of Ireland’s biggest cocaine seizure in 2007, The Young Offenders is a comedy road movie about two inner-city teenagers who look to cash in when a drug-trafficking boat capsizes off the coast of West Cork spilling 61 bales of cocaine.

Hilary Rose (The Republic of Telly), P.J Gallagher (Trojan Donkey) and Dominic Machale (Ronanism) star alongside rising stars Alex Murphy and Chris Walley.

Directed, written and produced by Peter Foott, executive producers include Cormac Fox and Rory Gilmartin.

The deal was brokered by Carnaby International’s Head of Acquisitions, Lorianne Hall, together with Peter Foott of Vico Films.