Founders

Founder

One of Britain's most acclaimed directors, John Boorman is also known as one of the commercial mainstream's most independently-minded directors. He has been quoted as saying "filmmaking is the process of turning money into light and then back into money again," an epigram whose simplicity has in many ways defined the trajectory of his career. Boorman has also produced most of his own films and is regarded by film bonders as a highly responsible producer who always brings a film in on - or more usually under - budget with very high production values.

 

Hollywood Debut

Boorman's Hollywood directing debut was with cult classic Point Blank (1967), which The Sunday Times has named as one of the ten best thrillers of all time. His first nomination at the Cannes International Film Festival was for Best Direction on Leo the Last (1970). Boorman’s Deliverance (1972), nominated for three Oscars, quickly became a classic. Other well-known works by John Boorman include Zardoz (1973; starring Sean Connery), Exorcist II: The Heretic (1977), The Emerald Forest (1985) and the acclaimed Excalibur (1981).

 

Best Direction Award

With Hope and Glory (1987), Boorman’s incredible narrative strength came back to the forefront. A surprisingly gentle, semi-autobiographical account of a boy's experiences during the London Blitz, it was hailed for its unforced exuberance. The General (1998) – which told the story of legendary, real-life Irish crime lord Martin Cahill – won the Best Direction award at Cannes. In 2004, John directed In My Country starring Samuel Jackson and Juliette Binoche, which won the peace award at the 2004 Berlin Film Festival.

 

Recent Features

Boorman's most recent picture, Queen & Country (2014), premiered at Directors’ Fortnight at the Cannes International Film Festival and was released as a commercial success across the US and Europe in 2015.

 

Published Author

Boorman is also a published author and has been a contributor and editor to thirteen annual editions of Projections, a series of books published by Faber & Faber (UK), in which filmmakers write about their craft. Boorman is also the author of “Money into Light: The Emerald Forest Diary”, which chronicles the three year journey Boorman took to make the film.

 

Fellowships

In 2013, the British Film Institute bestowed its highest honour to John Boorman with a presentation of a BFI fellowship.

In 2004, Boorman was awarded the BAFTA Fellowship, a lifetime achievement award presented by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts “in recognition of outstanding achievement in the art forms of the moving image”.

 

Founder and Chief Executive Officer

Kieran Corrigan is a chartered accountant and barrister. Kieran also lectured in Tax Law in the Trinity College Dublin Law School and University College Dublin Law School.

 

Film Producer and Financier

Kieran has collaborated with both John Boorman and Roger Corman for over 25 years. He has produced and arranged the financing for a significant number of international motion pictures including Country of My Skull (2004; starring Samuel L Jackson & Juliette Binoche); Evelyn (2002; starring Pierce Brosnan & Julianna Margulies); The Tiger’s Tail (2006; starring Kim Cattrall & Brendan Gleeson); The Tailor of Panama (2001; starring Pierce Brosnan, Geoffrey Rush, Jamie Lee Curtis & Daniel Radcliffe); The Serpents Kiss (1997; Ewan McGregor, Richard E. Grant & Greta Scacchi); Journey to Knock (1991; starring John Hurt, David Thewlis), The Treaty (1991 starring Brendan Gleeson) and The General (1998; starring Brendan Gleeson & Jon Voight).

 

Cannes Premier

A recent production, Queen and Country (2014; starring David Thewlis and Richard E. Grant), written and directed by John Boorman and released in 2015, premiered at the Cannes International Film Festival in 2014 to wide acclaim.

 

Animation Films

Kieran also financed two major animation features Thumbelina (1994) and Pebble and the Penguin (1995).

 

Recent Features

Most recently, Kieran was Executive Producer on Supervized (2018), starring Tom Berenger and Beau Bridges and directed by Steve Barron, as well as We Have Always Lived in the Castle (2018), developed by Michael Douglas’ production company, and starring Crispin Glover and Sebastian Stan.

 

Tax Expert

In addition to his experience in the areas of film production and film financing, Kieran is an expert in international tax law and has run a successful accountancy and corporate finance practice for many years. Total funds raised by Kieran for film projects to date have exceeded €150million.

 

Film Studio

Kieran established, in conjunction with Roger Corman, film studios in Galway, Ireland, which produced a significant number of films and which was responsible for training a large number of individuals who now form a significant core element of the Irish film industry.

 

Directorships

Kieran was also a director of Alliance Communications and Don Bluth Studios in Ireland. He formerly held the positions of member of the Irish Industrial Development Authority (IDA), the State-owned agency responsible for attracting multi-national investment into Ireland, for ten years, Chairman of the National Building Agency, the State-owned building agency, and a member of the State-controlled Custom House Docks Development Authority which established the Irish Financial Services Centre in Dublin.

Administration Staff

Chief Financial Officer

Joe Binchy is a Chartered Accountant who qualified with Price Waterhouse Cooper and has worked in the film industry for over twenty years.

 

Film Production Accountant

He has been a financial consultant and supervising accountant on a number of film productions, including Supervized (2018), We Have Always Lived in The Castle (2018), Queen and Country (2015), The Tiger’s Tail (2006) and The General (1998).

 

Film Financier

Joe has arranged finance for a number of productions under both the Irish Section 481 tax relief scheme for film investment and under a variety of international co-production structures.

Development and Production Manager

A graduate of Trinity Laban Conservatoire of Music and Dance and Goldsmiths University, Anna-Rose works extensively in theatre on both the performing and producing side. She previously worked at Discovery Network (home of the Discovery Channel, TLC, DMax, ID and many more) in London and has a weekly RTE radio show. She is currently assisting in co-ordinating the pre-production on 3 upcoming Merlin Films projects.

Instructors

Filmmaking Lead Tutor

John Boorman leads the IFS Filmmaking course.  John is supported by a team of professional film industry crew. 

 

Famous Feature Films

John is best known for his feature films such as Point Blank, Deliverance, Excalibur, The General, The Tailor of Panama and Queen and Country. 

 

Published Author

John is a published author and has been a contributor and editor to numerous editions of Projections, a series of books published by Faber & Faber (UK) which presents filmmakers reflections on their craft.

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Awards

John has directed 22 films and been the recipient of 5 Academy Award nominations, twice for Best Director (for Deliverance and Hope and Glory). He is also credited with creating the first Academy Award screeners to promote The Emerald Forest. John received the BAFTA Fellowship for lifetime achievement from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts.

 

Merlin Films

John is a Director of Merlin Films, a leading independent Irish film production company. Merlin Films has been involved in the production of numerous major feature films for international markets since its inception.

 

Career Influencer

At Merlin Films, John has worked with international talent for over two decades, including Samuel L Jackson, Pierce Brosnan, Kim Cattrall, Brendan Gleeson, Ewan McGregor, Richard E. Grant, Jamie Lee Curtis, John Hurt and Jon Voight.

 

 

Film and TV Production Lead Tutor

Trisha Flood leads the IFS Film and TV Production course.

 

Experienced Instructor

Trisha is a graduate of the National Film School in IADT Dun Laoghaire Dublin where she specialised in Production and Screenwriting. She would later go on to complete her masters in Digital Film Production in Staffordshire University and a postgraduate degree in Digital Marketing from the National College of Ireland.

Trisha has been working as a freelance Producer, Line Producer and Tutor for over ten years. During this time she has gained extensive experience in the industry and has produced a number of successful shorts, commercials, feature films and TV series which have screened at numerous festivals across Europe & the US and been broadcast on the likes of the BBC, Netflix and RTÉ.

Brand clients have included: Apple, Bacardi, Virgin Media, Bombay Sapphire and Grants Whiskey to name but a few.

 

Film and Television Producer

Trisha currently works as the Production Executive of Emmy awarding winning production company Deadpan Pictures (Can’t Cope, Won’t Cope, Moone Boy, Spin The Bottle and more). Trisha oversees all the companies current and upcoming productions.

Along with this Trisha also has her own company and is currently in development on a Screen Ireland backed feature film. which is due to shoot later this year.

 

Notable Work

  • The Last Right - Associate Producer (Post Production)
  • 4 Kids & It - Production Executive (Post Production)
  • Women On the Verge (RTÉ, UKTV)- Production Executive
  • Can’t Cope Won’t Cope (RTÉ, Netflix) - Production Executive
  • QED (Short Film) - Producer - (Winner Best Short - Santa Fe Film Festival, Mexico International Film Festival)
  • Cardboard Gangsters - Line Producer - Official Selection Galway Film Festival 2016, Winner Best Feature & Film of the Festival Manchester Film Festival 2017, Winner Outstanding Achievement in Filmmaking: Foreign Film Newport Film Festival)
  • An Cát (TG4)- Producer - (Galway Film Festival 2014, Winner Best Irish Language Short - Fingal film Festival 2015, Winner Best Script - Limerick Film Festival 2015)
  • Keys to the City - Producer - Official Selection Galway Film Festival 2012, Dublin Film Festival 2013, Chicago Irish Film Festival, Titanic Film Festival Budapest, Stoker Film Festival, Rome Irish Film Festival.

 

Business of Film Lead Tutor

Kieran Corrigan leads the IFS Business of Film course. Kieran is supported by a team of qualified business professionals with experience of working in the film industry.

 

Experienced Instructor

Kieran has lectured in Tax Law in the Trinity College Dublin Law School and University College Dublin Law School.

 

Published Author

Kieran is the published author of a two volume publication “Revenue Law” from Round Hall that examines - in detail - the concepts, principles and practice underlying the Irish revenue law system.

 

 

Merlin Films

Kieran is a Director of Merlin Films, a leading independent Irish film production company. Merlin Films has been involved in the production of numerous major feature films for international markets since its inception.

Independent work produced by Merlin includes The Treaty (1992), Angela Mooney (1996) and The General (1998), the latter of which won the best director award at the Cannes Film Festival. Our other major releases include The Tailor of Panama (2001), Evelyn (2002), In My Country (2004), The Tiger’s Tail (2006) and Queen and County (2014).

 

Recent Feature Films

Recent films include Supervized (2018), starring Tom Berenger and Beau Bridges and directed by Steve Barron, and We Have Always Lived in the Castle (2018), developed by Michael Douglas’s production company and starring Crispin Glover, Alexandra Daddario and Sebastian Stan.

Smart Filmmaking Lead Tutor

Roger Corman leads the IFS Smart Filmmaking course. 

 

Famous Feature Films

Roger is revered in the film industry for his ground-breaking work in the genres of horror, fantasy and science fiction. He has written, directed and produced hundreds of films during his career to date

His best-known features include Attack of the Crab Monsters (1957), The Little Shop of Horrors (1960), The Intruder (1962), The Pit and the Pendulum (1961) and Frankenstein Unbound (1990).

His latest film, the genre mash up Death Race 2050 was released in 2016.

 

Published Author

Roger is the author of the bestselling, hilarious autobiography “How I Made a Hundred Movies in Hollywood and Never Lost a Dime”.

 

Academy Award

Corman was the youngest filmmaker to have a retrospective at the Cinémathèque Française, as well as the British Film Institute and the Museum of Modern Art. He was the co-founder of New World Pictures, a prolific multimedia company that helped to cement Fox as a major American television network, and is a long-time member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

In 2009, he was awarded an Honorary Academy Award for "for his rich engendering of films and filmmakers."

 

New Horizons

Roger and his wife Julie Corman formed New Horizons Pictures in 1983 after selling New World Productions the previous year. Producing some of the most beloved cult classics of their era, New World also proved to be a training facility for a generation of the greatest film talent of all time.

New Horizons in the last decade has partnered with SyFy, Sony, Netflix, and most recently Universal Pictures to create fast-paced, youth-oriented content for the next generation of film lovers.

 

Career Influencer

Corman mentored and gave a start to many young film directors such as Francis Ford Coppola, Ron Howard, Martin Scorsese, Jonathan Demme, John Sayles, and James Cameron and was highly influential in the New Hollywood filmmaking movement of the 1960s and 70s. He also helped to launch the careers of actors like Peter Fonda, Jack Nicholson, Dennis Hopper, Bruce Dern, Sylvester Stallone, Diane Ladd, and William Shatner.

VFX Lead Tutor

Jahirul Amin of DNEG leads the Visual FX course.

DNEG is a visual effects and computer animation company that was founded in 1998 in London. It is one of the leading companies today in the field of Visual Effects.

 

Experienced Instructors

DNEG deliver “Greenlight”, in-house VFX and animation graduate training programmes, and are highly experienced instructors. The Greenlight programme is delivered in-house at their offices in London, Vancouver and Montréal.

 

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Doctor Who

DNEG became the primary visual effects team for Doctor Who in that show's eleventh series.

 

Academy Awards

The company has received four Academy Awards for their work on the films Inception, Interstellar, Ex Machina and Blade Runner 2049. In addition, DNEG has received Visual Effects Society awards for films such as Inception, Sherlock Holmes, Interstellar and Dunkirk, as well as BAFTA awards for Inception, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2, Interstellar and Blade Runner 2049.

 

In-Production Projects

DNEG are currently working on a large number of film projects which include:

  • Deadpool 2
  • Ant-Man and the Wasp
  • Mission Impossible: Fallout
  • Venom
  • First Man
  • Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald
  • Alita: Battle Angel
  • The Kid Who Would Be King
  • Godzilla: King of Monsters
     

Career Influencers

DNEG is a rapidly expanding business and is actively seeking new talent to join their team.

With openings in VFX, animation, technology and intern apprenticeships this is a sector that offers real career opportunities.

DNEG’s in-house Greenlight programmes deliver intensive dedicated training, live production experience and mentoring with existing DNEG artists and supervisors. Greenlight has been designed to offer the support and expertise to fully realise the potential of the next generation of VFX artists.

Future of TV and Cross-Platform Production Lead Tutor

John Lynch, Head of Production at Amazon Studios, leads the IFS Future of TV and Cross-Platform Production course.

 

Experienced Instructors

John currently lectures on ‘The Business of New Media and the Future of Television’ At the Department of Cinema and Television Arts at “California State University”, Northridge.

 

Career

John was hired as Head of Production for Amazon Studios in 2012 and built the Studios’ entire production infrastructure, overseeing the many pilots produced since its inception and all series in production.

Over 15 shows were launched by Amazon in John’s first four months, with John being instrumental in all of Amazon’s policymaking for the studio including finance, legal and business affairs. John works with Amazon’s creative executives on a daily basis in tracking their development and productions.

Prior to Amazon, John ran Devlin Entertainment and previously partnered in two other production companies, Lynch-Siderow Productions and Lynch Entertainment. John has extensive experience in developing and producing comedy and reality shows, working with MTV and on the hugely successful movies Jackass and Jackass 2. He has been a producer on over 40 shows and movies.

 

Amazon Studios

Amazon Studios

Amazon Studios brings bold and innovative series and films from top tier and up-and-coming creators to customers in over 200 countries and territories. Original productions range from daring and timely subject matter such as Amy Sherman-Palladino’s award-winning The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel and acclaimed filmmaker Spike Lee’s Chi-Raq; to the critically hailed The Grand Tour, Mozart in the Jungle and Man in the High Castle.

 

Academy Awards

In film, Amazon Studios produces and acquires original movies for theatrical release and early window distribution exclusively for Amazon Prime members. At the 2017 Academy Awards, Amazon Studios became the first streaming service to win Oscars for Manchester by the Sea (Best Screenplay, Kenneth Lonergan and Best Actor, Casey Affleck) and Asghar Farhadi’s The Salesman (Best Foreign Film).

 

Notable Work

Recent notable releases include the box office success The Big Sick, which is one of the top streaming films on Prime, Nash Edgerton’s Gringo, Lynne Ramsay’s You Were Never Really Here, Lauren Greenfield’s Generation Wealth and Gus Van Sant’s Don’t Worry, He Won’t Get Far on Foot.

One of the world's leading cinematographers, Philippe has worked with directors such as John Boorman, Robert Redford, Neil Jordan, Stephen Frears, Tim Burton, and Guy Ritchie, in a wide variety of photographic styles and genres, from intimate dramas to fantasy to blockbusters. He is both an Oscar and a Bafta winner.

His films include: Hope and Glory, Interview With The Vampire, Dangerous Liaisons, Planet of the Apes, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, Sherlock Holmes, A River Runs Through It, and more recently the two Fantastic Beasts films.

As a film director, Philippe made the feature film The Serpent's Kiss in 1997.

An outstanding stage and screen actress, Lia Williams has been nominated for a Tony Award on Broadway, and 3 Olivier Awards in the West End. Most recently switching roles with Juliet Stevenson between Elizabeth 1 and Mary Stuart at a live coin toss at The Duke Of York’s Theatre in The West End.

Her 54 film and television credits include The King is Alive for Dogma films, May 33rd- BAFTA nominated best actress, The Russian Bride- winner Best Actress at FIPA, Wallis Simpson in The Crown, The Missing, His Dark Materials and has just completed filming a lead in a new 6 part series for BBC1, The Capture.

Lia has directed one feature documentary ‘Nanaboshung’ and 3 shorts: Feathers, 10 Minute Tales for Channel 4, and the Bafta-nominated and Raindance Best Film winner The Stronger.

Lia is about to begin rehearsals playing opposite Clive Owen in ‘The Night Of The Iguana’ by Tennessee Williams at the Noel Coward Theatre in the West End. And she has 2 films in development to direct..

Jina Jay is a casting director whose most recent credits include ‘Black Mirror’ for Charlie Brooker & Annabel Jones, ‘The Little Drummer Girl’ for Park Chan-Wook, ‘Farming’ for Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, ‘Darkest Hour’ for Joe Wright, ‘Rogue One: A Star Wars Story’ for Gareth Edwards and ‘Bird Box’ and ‘The Night Manager’ for Susanne Bier.

Industry Advisory Groups

Film Production

Merlin Films is a leading independent Irish film production company, which was founded in 1989. Its directors are Kieran Corrigan, one of Ireland’s leading film producers, and John Boorman, the renowned film director. Based in Dublin and with offices in London, Merlin Films has been involved in the production of numerous major feature films for international markets since its inception.

 

Best Director Award

Independent work produced by Merlin includes The Treaty (1992), Angela Mooney (1996) and The General (1998), the latter of which won the best director award at the Cannes Film Festival. Other major releases include The Tailor of Panama (2001), Evelyn (2002), In My Country (2004), The Tiger’s Tail (2006) and Queen and County (2014).

 

Recent Releases

Recent films include Supervized (2018), starring Tom Berenger and Beau Bridges and directed by Steve Barron, and We Have Always Lived in the Castle (2018), developed by Michael Douglas’s production company and starring Crispin Glover, Alexandra Daddario and Sebastian Stan.

 

International Talent

Merlin Films has worked with international talent for over two decades, including Samuel L Jackson, Pierce Brosnan, Kim Cattrall, Brendan Gleeson, Ewan McGregor, Richard E. Grant, Jamie Lee Curtis, John Hurt and Jon Voight.

 

Great Point Media

The Great Point group combines a unique blend of Great Point Media’s experience in entertainment media, along with Great Point Investment’s experience in alternative investments, which has made Great Point one of today’s leading suppliers of original media content.