Daisy Asquith – After the Dance #CFF60

November 13, 2015

Daisy Asquith - After the Dance #CFF60 fredfilmradio

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Daisy Asquith – director – After the Dance

FRED’s Matt Micucci meets director Daisy Asquith, whose documentary AFTER THE DANCE screened at the 60th Cork Film Festival.

A very personal documentary, Asquith talks to FRED about the challenges of making it and the opposition she encountered from members of the family who were reluctant of her exposing such a personal and obviously delicate part of their family history.

But we also talk about the significance of AFTER THE DANCE in view of its portrayal of the Irish society of the forties and fifties, and the effects it still has on Ireland to this day.

AFTER THE DANCE: In this funny and moving documentary, acclaimed film-maker Daisy Asquith tells the very personal story of her mother’s conception after a dance in the 1940s on the remote west coast of Ireland.

By exploring the repercussions of this act, Daisy and her mother embark on a fascinating and emotional adventure in social and sexual morality. Her grandmother, compelled to run away to have her baby in secret, handed the child over to ‘the nuns’. Daisy’s mum was eventually adopted by English Catholics from Stoke-on-Trent. Her grandmother returned to Ireland and told no-one. The father remained a mystery for another 60 years, until Daisy and her mum decided it was time to find out who he was.

Their attempts to find the truth make raw the fear and shame that Catholicism has wrought on the Irish psyche for centuries. It leads Daisy and her mum to connect with a brand new family living an extraordinarily different life.