Baggotonia - Film - Ghosts of Baggotonia

About the Film and the Event

Baggotonia Festival is delighted and honoured to host a screening of the Film of the Festival, Ghosts of Baggotonia which will be attended by film maker and writer Alan Gilsenan at the newly opened Lansdowne Hotel Theatre at the heart of Baggotonia.

This extraordinary film is an evocative and poetic work exploring the literary and other ghosts of the bohemian quarter bordering Dublin’s Baggot Street during the mid-20th century where the radical flourishing of artistic and intellectual activity.

Baggotonia of that era was both a community and a cultural movement, populated by writers, artists, eccentrics, and other intellectuals living an anarchic life at odds with the conservative mores of the time. Inspired by luminous black and white photographs from artist Nevill Johnson, Alan Gilsenan’s richly evocative work draws on the writings of Patrick Kavanagh, Samuel Beckett, Flann O’Brien, and Brendan Behan, among others, to conjure a tapestry of place and memory. The film uses an impressionistic, poetic visual language for this highly personal work, which takes the form of a collage of overlayed images, spoken recordings, narration, and music which creates an immersive, hypnotic experience.

Ghosts of Baggotonia Trailer and Information

The trailer for Ghosts of Baggotonia can be seen here -

To read more about the film and the director please see visit the following links:

https://www.rte.ie/culture/2023/0911/1282122-dublin-film-festival-searching-for-the-ghosts-of-baggotonia/

https://ifi.ie/film/ghosts-of-baggotonia/

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt31860283/

About Filmmaker Alan Gilsenan

Alan Gilsenan is a renowned Irish writer, filmmaker and theatre director. His work includes the award-winning cinema documentary The Days of Trees, the documentary Meetings with Ivor, the feature film Unless, based on a novel by Carol Shields and The Meeting, which he wrote and directed and premiered at the 2018 Dublin Film Festival.

Alan is a former chairperson of the Irish Film Institute. He also served on the Irish Film Board, and on the board of the International Dance Festival Ireland. Between 2009 and 2014 he served on the board of Raidió Teilifís Éireann, where he chaired the Editorial and Creative Output Committee. He is currently on the Board of Fighting Words, a creative writing centre for young people founded by Sean Love & novelist Roddy Doyle. To learn more about Ghosts of Baggotonia filmmaker Alan Gilsenan please visit the links below:

https://www.instagram.com/alangilsenan/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alan_Gilsenan

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0319690/

Host or Publisher Baggotonia Festival