Route Irish Finished Filming

KEN LOACH REUNITES WITH CHRIS MENGES TO FILM “ROUTE IRISH”

The Loach/Laverty 2009 project, Route Irish finished filming on Friday, the 13th of November. The film is now in post production. The film reunites the acclaimed film partnership of director Ken Loach (Looking for Eric, The Wind that Shakes the Barley) and cinematographer Chris Menges (The Killing Fields, The Misson) who first worked together on Poor Cow (1967) and the classic Kes (1970).  Principal photography completes in mid-November.  Route Irish  is written by Paul Laverty and produced by Rebecca O’Brien, both long term Loach collaborators.

Route Irish is a tense, triangular love story of two friends and the woman they both love. The men work as private security contractors in Iraq.  Together they risk their lives in a city awash with violence and greed. When Frankie is killed on Route Irish (the road linking Baghdad airport with the Green Zone), Fergus, wracked with grief and guilt, rejects the official explanation and determines to investigate the truth of his friend’s death. 

The film stars Mark Womack (“Sorted”, “Moving On”) and Andrea Lowe ( “Silent Witness”, “Where the Heart is”) both making their feature film debuts.  Comedian John Bishop joins the supporting cast of Trevor Williams and Talib Rasool.  Liverpudlian local hero and war veteran Craig Lundberg also plays a key role.

Route Irish is a Sixteen Films Why Not Productions and Wild Bunch production made with the support of Les Films de Fleuve, BIM, Diaphana, Tornasol and Alta.  Other financiers are France 2 and North West Vision Media.  Wild Bunch is handling international sales.

17th of November 2009