Hot for 2020 Film/TV: Ciaran Cassidy

Filmmaker and documentarian Ciaran Cassidy is an award-winning director. His short film The Last Days Of Peter Bergmann premiered at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival, winning the Stranger Than Fiction audience award. Elsewhere, it also scooped the IFTA for Best Irish Short Film and a Jury award at the Nashville Film Festival. His first feature screenplay, the gripping cycling drama The Racer, is currently in post-production, and February sees the release of his fascinating documentary Jihad Jane. It tells the unbelievable story of two American women – one of whom named herself ‘Jihad Jane’ – arrested in high-profile circumstances in Waterford, and dubbed ‘the new face of terrorism’ by the US attorney’s office. Facing huge jail sentences, the two women pleaded guilty. But for the first time ever, with unprecedented access, Jihad Jane tells the story of the most absurd terror cell ever to come together.