The official trailer for Mark O’Connor’s gritty Dublin gangland feature Cardboard Gangsters has been released today.

Cardboard Gangsters, which stars John Connors (King of the Travellers, Love/Hate), Fionn Walton (Out of Here, What Richard Did), Kierston Wareing (Fish Tank, Eastenders) and Hot Press favourite Paul Alwright (FKA Lethal Dialect) follows a group of wannabe gangsters as they attempt to gain control of the drug trade in Darndale, chasing the glorified lifestyle of money, power and sex.

Jay Connolly (Connors) is a part-time DJ and low-level drug dealer. When his welfare is cut off he decides it’s time for him and his gang to enter the big leagues. This attracts the attention of the local King Pin and sets Jay down a violent and bloody path.

Wowing festival audiences around the globe, the film picked up three awards at Manchester Film Festival (Best Actor, Best Feature Film and Film of the Festival) earlier this year and was awarded Outstanding Achievement in Filmmaking at the Newport Beach Film Festival in California last week where it was described as having “the feverish temperament of a Guy Ritchie picture, the ghetto angst of Danny Boyle’s Trainspotting, and the realism of Ken Loach and Mike Leigh’s finest films. Unflinching, sadistic, and unabashedly realistic.”

The film was directed by Mark O’Connor who co-wrote the screenplay with John Connors. It was produced for Stalker Films and Five Knight Films in association with Filmbase and with the support of the BAI, Egg Post Production and TV3.

Cardboard Gangsters will be released in Irish cinemas on the 16th June by Wildcard Distribution.