This years’ opening Gala will be Ondine, and Gráinne pretty well summed it up at the launch by saying it was a homecoming for Neil Jordan.

The inimitable Mr. Jordan has never been an official guest at the JDIFF, although a documentary on him was featured in the 5th festival. In Colin Farrell he arrives with not only an Irish star, but one of the acting world’s leading faces. Since last we saw him (the 2008 festival, which he launched with In Bruges), the bold Farrell has been relatively quiet, but being a father will do that to a body. With that considered, 2010 promises to be a bumper year for him, with Ondine, Triage and the upcoming thesp fest that is At Swim-Two-Birds. But here I’ve digressed, I should be talking about Ondine. A strange and beautiful fairy story, it shows Jordan coming back to his Irish roots to show us what happens when the mundane and the extraordinary collide. A sort of odd bedfellow for The Butcher Boy then, but probably with less wanton slaughter. Or, for those of you with attention span problems, it has Colin Farrell, catching a Mermaid. Catching. A. Mermaid. What part of that is not amazing, seriously?

Jameson are a fun and handy sponsor to have. Most people, even pioneers will accept that alcohol tends to seem kinda cool, even though it must of course be ingested sensibly. As such, their Gala is always deserving of the term ‘event’. And so we have Patricia Clarkson lending not only the air of class that’s already been mentioned, but a serious touch of cool. Exploring all the beauty of the Egyptian city while simultaneously being an intimate story about relationships and temptation, Cairo Time is a wondrous, floating, semi-lucid affair; not unlike being pleasantly drunk.

Closing us out we have another of those fabulously classy ladies. Ms. Tilda Swinton graces us with her multilingual beauty on the 28th and the only shame is that we don’t get her for longer. Moving deftly between American arthouse, Scottish indie, European experimentalism and the mainstream, she is amazingly versatile. Here she wears the second last of those hats in the visual feast that is I am Love. A really extraordinary depiction of passion, restraint and the intricacies that make a family, I am Love will leave is fat, happy and waiting for 2011.

Rory Bonass

Sarah Smyth

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