A Walk In The Park

Friendly but fidgety, director Darragh Byrne has the air of a man who’s efficient, but overworked. Constantly running his fingers through his hair and apologising when he suddenly disappears to take a call, it appears the Irish filmmaker is still adjusting to being in great demand. But with his debut feature film Parked the winner of multiple awards at film festivals in Paris, Brussels and Boston, he may have to get used to it.

After making documentary films for over 20 years and running a production company, it was a combination of passion, love for storytelling and the aid of Irish filmmaking initiatives that eventually brought Parked to fruition. Having met writer Ciaran Creagh in 2007 through the Irish Film Board’s Catalyst project, which funded Conor Horgan’s award-winning post-apocalyptic drama One Hundred Mornings, Byrne began working on a script about a man living in his car, not realising that three years on, it would resonate with all those affected by and aware of Ireland’s economic crisis.
“To some degree, having a documentary conscious, I think I would have been thinking that there were certain things a little askew a little bit before that time, before 2008. I mean the peak of the recession was really 2006 and the subsequent recession in 2007, so in the ether of that the film emerged. But it wasn’t a conscious examination of Irish society now. I wouldn’t like to think of it as a very issue-driven film. It’s very much a story of a man living in his car, and a kind of triumvirate of characters who come together and are of out of step with the world generally. Somehow they manage to learn something from each other and come out the other side.
“But internationally and in European terms, people have an idea of what Ireland is and what’s going on here in terms of recession. In Rotterdam where the film went down really well but audiences would ask, ‘Are things really that bad in Ireland, are people really living in their cars?’ So of course if you were to look at the film as a snapshot of Ireland now it wouldn’t be an accurate representation. It’s not supposed to be that. The economic situation did inspire some new facets to the audience reaction that I wasn’t expecting.”
One thing Byrne was sure of was the talent of the cast, which includes David Wilmot, Michael McElhatton and, of course, the brilliant Colm Meaney, whose beautiful and restrained performance was anchored by his deep exploration of the character.
“Obviously being my first film, I may have been ever so slightly intimidated by Colm! But we got on instantly and I think we found a very strong common understanding about who his character Fred Daly was. We worked a lot on Fred and found a few different keys to his character, like his glasses. Colm tried on many, many pairs of glasses to find the right ones. Colm quoted that Dustin Hoffman thing of always wanting back the first three days of filming – until you actually absorb yourself in the character a little bit and do a bit of filming you’re not quite certain where the character is. And I remember on the third day of filming or so, Colm found Fred Daly’s walk. We both realised he was walking as Fred should. It was an interesting journey to take with him.”
Hopes are high now that Parked will benefit from the recent success of The Guard, which was handled by the same distribution company.
“It’s great for Irish film that Element has done so well with The Guard, I think it’s the first time an Irish distributor has had such a great success. So that will hopefully fare well for Irish film generally, I hope.”
Byrne is realistic about the limited potential of the Irish market.
“It’s really difficult to get feature films made anywhere, and Ireland is very small, the market is very limited. You need to be realistic about it. If you’re trying to develop and broaden your career making feature films, you need to be involved in the UK and the US in a big way. It’s very important to have any kind of presence there. It’s not something I’d necessarily relish, but it’s something I may have to do,
However Byrne isn’t going anywhere just yet, as he’s currently busy developing two films with the Irish Film Board, the drama The Valentine Gang and the psychological thriller The Good Heart. It seems an award-winning feature debut doesn’t automatically lead to an easy life.
“No, no. I’m not even sure winning an Oscar leads to an easy life. Though I’d like to find out!”

Parked is in cinemas from October 14.