By Vittoria Vignolo
National identity is very important when it comes to the development and representation of countries.
But why?
Today I will describe how national identity influences the development of cinema and I will provide some good examples of Irish films that portray Ireland in a very good way. Since the very early filmmaking era internationalism was centralised, and films were adapted to different markets with various languages.
However, when the Hollywood studios started to develop as the biggest part of the movie industry, national productions started to take over as an alternative to Hollywood. It is essential to recognise the importance of cultural identity, as it defines a lot of public thought about the country.
Irish cultural nationalism has become a modern process, after the Irish independence, with the movie being Irish Destiny (1926) which is the first film that depicts the irish war of independence . Although Irish filmmaking has been very strong in the early stages of cinema, it has rather been intermittent and mostly directed by non-Irish directors. I believe most early irish films were created and directed by non-Irish filmmakers, and that failed the truthful representation of Irishness.
Despite Ireland’s lack of native filmmaking culture, in the past decades there has been a few notable changes in this. Most of these new movies represent Ireland in a non-stereotypical way and value most aspects that were previously not seen in other movies. Some good films in this regard have been produced in 2022, such as The Banshees of Inisherin, An Cailín Ciúin and The Wonder.
I believe that it is important to maintain cultural identity within the film industry, to avoid stereotypically biased opinions and representations.