'Float Like a Butterfly' screening set for Cavan

A screening of Irish film 'Float Like a Butterfly' tomorrow evening will serve to kickstart the Cavan Traveller Movement's summer scheme of events.

The special screening of the award winning film takes place at Cavan's Odeon Cinema on Tuesday, July 9, from 6pm.

The screening is supported through Cavan County Council and PEACE IV funding.

Directed by Carmel Winters and starring Hazel Doupe, Dara Devaney, Aidan O'Hare, Lalor Roddy, Lisa Lambe, 'Float Like a Butterfly' is set at the time of former world champion Muhammad Ali's visit to Ireland in 1972 to fight Alvin Lewis in Croke Park.

In the movie, boxing is a passion for the young Frances (Doupe).

In rural Ireland in the 1960s, Frances (Hazel Doupe) is a young Traveller who has coped with tragedy from an early age. When her father Michael (Dara Devaney) is imprisoned, Frances learns to fend for herself and her brother, developing a love of boxing and a devotion to Muhammad Ali inherited from her father. Their peaceful life in the camp on the picturesque West Cork coast is disrupted when Michael returns from prison, gathers his children and takes to the road.

Against a portrait of Traveller culture that is both nostalgic in its campfire singalongs, tinsmiths and barrel-topped caravans and grim in its depiction of an alcohol-fuelled violent patriarchy, director Carmel Winters celebrates the tenacity of a young woman determined to break with tradition and forge her own destiny.

'Float Like a Butterfly' won Best Feature Film Script, Zebbies 2018; the Audience Award for Best Film, Cork International Film Festival 2018; and the FIPRESCI Discovery Prize, Toronto International Film Festival 2018.