Northern Ireland Screen is the national screen agency for

Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label=Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the island of Ireland, that is #Descriptions, variously described as ...

. The agency's purpose is to promote the development of a sustainable film, animation and television production industry.About Us > Overview
Northern Ireland Screen website, URL accessed 24 November 2008

History

Northern Ireland Screen was established as the Northern Ireland Film Council in 1989, subsequently the Northern Ireland Film & Television Commission (1997). The agency is funded jointly by the

Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure The Department of Culture, Arts and Leisure (DCAL), translated in Irish as and in Ulster-Scots as , was a devolved government department in the Northern Ireland Executive. The minister with overall responsibility for the department was the ...

Invest Northern Ireland Invest Northern Ireland (Invest NI) is Northern Ireland's regional economic development agency. It is a non-departmental public body (NDPB) of the Department for the Economy (DfE). According to DETI's website it; "supports business growth and in ...

and the

UK Film Council The UK Film Council (UKFC) was a non-departmental public body set up in 2000 to develop and promote the film industry in the UK. It was constituted as a private company limited by guarantee, owned by the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and ...

. The

Arts Council of Northern Ireland The Arts Council of Northern Ireland (Irish: ''Comhairle Ealaíon Thuaisceart Éireann'', Ulster-Scots: ''Airts Cooncil o Norlin Airlan'') is the lead development agency for the arts in Northern Ireland. It was founded in 1964, as a successor to ...

have delegated the administration of Lottery funding for film in Northern Ireland to Northern Ireland Screen. Northern Ireland Screen is responsible for the £12 million

Irish Language Irish (Standard Irish: ), also known as Gaelic, is a Goidelic language of the Insular Celtic branch of the Celtic language family, which is a part of the Indo-European language family. Irish is indigenous to the island of Ireland and was ...

Broadcast Fund. The funds purpose is to provide for an increase in Irish-language broadcasting in Northern Ireland by the BBC and TG4.

Notable projects

Northern Ireland Screen provides funding to a number of key projects relating to cinema in the region, including: *

Belfast Film Festival The Belfast Film Festival is Northern Ireland's largest film festival, attracting over 25,000 people annually. Since its founding in 1995, the festival has grown to include the Docs Ireland international documentary festival, as well as an Audi ...

* CineMagic Film Festival *

Foyle Film Festival Foyle Film Festival is an annual film festival based in Derry, Northern Ireland Northern Ireland ( ga, Tuaisceart Éireann ; sco, label= Ulster-Scots, Norlin Airlann) is a part of the United Kingdom, situated in the north-east of the isla ...

Queen's Film Theatre The Queen's Film Theatre or QFT is an independent cinema at Queen's University Belfast, Northern Ireland founded in 1968. When first opened, the Queen’s Film Theatre focused mainly on art house, indie and world cinema, playing an important role ...

NIS has also participated in the digitising project Unlocking Film Heritage.

The Paint Hall

"The Paint Hall" is a historic building in

Titanic Quarter, Belfast Titanic Quarter in Belfast, Northern Ireland, is a large-scale waterfront regeneration, comprising historic maritime landmarks, film studios, education facilities, apartments, a riverside entertainment district, and the world's largest Titanic ...

. It was once the main

Harland and Wolff Harland & Wolff is a British shipbuilding company based in Belfast, Northern Ireland. It specialises in ship repair, shipbuilding and offshore construction. Harland & Wolff is famous for having built the majority of the ocean liners for the W ...

painting hall and includes a large indoor space. Now a film studio, originally created by film producer

Jo Gilbert Joanne Lesley Gilbert (7 June 1955 – 15 September 2018) was an English film producer and casting director based in Holywood, near Belfast, Northern Ireland, and ran Real Holywood Productions. Career Producing At the time of her death, Jo G ...

, it was the location for the filming of

Spike Milligan Terence Alan "Spike" Milligan (16 April 1918 – 27 February 2002) was an Irish actor, comedian, writer, musician, poet, and playwright. The son of an English mother and Irish father, he was born in British Colonial India, where he spent his ...

's ''

Puckoon ''Puckoon'' is a comic novel by Spike Milligan, first published in 1963. It is his first full-length novel, and only major fictional work. Set in 1924, it details the troubles brought to the fictional Irish village of Puckoon by the Partition of ...

'' in 2000. The building is currently on licence to Northern Ireland Screen, who have plans to offer it rent free to film makers. The Paint Hall was the location of the City of Ember in the 2008 film of the same name. Starting in 2010 it was used as the main studio for the HBO fantasy series ''

Game of Thrones ''Game of Thrones'' is an American fantasy drama television series created by David Benioff and D. B. Weiss for HBO. It is an adaptation of '' A Song of Ice and Fire'', a series of fantasy novels by George R. R. Martin, the fir ...

'', which debuted in April 2011.

References

External links

*
NI Digital Film Archive
{{Authority control Cinema of Northern Ireland 1997 establishments in Northern Ireland Organizations established in 1997 Non-Departmental Public Bodies of the Northern Ireland Executive Film organisations in the United Kingdom Film production companies of the United Kingdom

History

Notable projects

The Paint Hall

See also

References

External links