Dáire McNab grew up with a mild interest in films until he realized aged 16 that he wasn’t good enough for a career in any of his chosen sports. He wrote three feature film scripts in 5th year of secondary school, and, undeterred, enrolled in Trinity College to study Film Studies and English. He became an active member of the university’s filmmaking society, with one of his shorts, ‘Nirvana’, winning the main prize in the 2008 National Student Film Festival.
At this point McNab had finished his studies, and, after a scriptwriting assignment for an American producer came to nought, he resolved to make his first feature film in the summer of 2008. ‘The Farm’ was a horror film largely set in the Irish countryside, and was filmed over 16 days on a self-financed budget. The film received its World Premiere at the little-remembered South Tipperary Film Festival, where it won the prize for ‘Best Young Director’. It also screened at the Abertoir Festival in Wales, and shortly afterwards was signed for distribution by an American company, Maxim Media International. The film was eventually released in DVD and VOD across North America in October 2010, to an underwhelmed response.
By this stage McNab had completed principal photography on his second film, ‘The Gingerbread Men’. Described (for legal reasons) as being ‘loosely-inspired-by-but-not-an-adaptation-of’ J. P. Donleavy’s novel ‘The Ginger Man’, McNab began work on the script the day after he finished his final college exams in 2007, and eventually filmed it in summer 2010. Featuring approximately 30 speaking roles, it is his largest production to date, but was filmed on a similar micro-budget to ‘The Farm’. The film screened at two festivals in 2012, but failed to secure a distribution deal, and was self-released in January 2013.
Still undeterred, McNab began production on his third film, ‘The Three Sisters’, in July 2012. Resolving not to plough all his available money into a film yet again, this film had a budget of around half the previous two. It was filmed in bits and pieces over a two year period, using an eight page treatment rather than a conventional script, with the story being refined as he filmed. Marking a return to the thriller/horror genre, the film guest stars genre legend Giovanni Lombardo Radice (‘Cannibal Ferox’, ‘City of the Living Dead’, ‘Gangs of New York’) and premiered at the Horror-on-Sea Festival in the UK. An official soundtrack album was released in mid-2015, and the film went on to screen at several Irish festivals, and was released on DVD and VOD across North America in 2017.
The same year saw the release of the 'Grindsploitation' trilogy of fake trailers, inspired (belatedly) by the fake trailers which played around the main features in Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez's 'Grindhouse' project in 2007. McNab's contribution, a trailer for a film-that-doesn't-exist called 'The Samurai Motorcycle Horror Gang', was one of the few trailers in the project that wasn't absolute dogshit.
His fourth, and, best, feature film is comedy-drama 'The Last Roll', which will premiere in 2020.
Future projects include a Spanish language western called ‘Mexican Stand-Off’, a dark thriller/character study called ‘The Detective’, and a dogme film. He is also a published author, placing mystery stories in North American magazines under a pseudonym.
As this handsome youngish tyro continues to fly ever higher in his pursuit of excellence, flanked by his growing flock of magnificent films, nothing can stop him reaching his stated goal of ‘Extreme Artistic Excellence’ apart from the limits of the cinematic medium, premature death, and the stupidity of festival programmers, critics and audiences alike.
At this point McNab had finished his studies, and, after a scriptwriting assignment for an American producer came to nought, he resolved to make his first feature film in the summer of 2008. ‘The Farm’ was a horror film largely set in the Irish countryside, and was filmed over 16 days on a self-financed budget. The film received its World Premiere at the little-remembered South Tipperary Film Festival, where it won the prize for ‘Best Young Director’. It also screened at the Abertoir Festival in Wales, and shortly afterwards was signed for distribution by an American company, Maxim Media International. The film was eventually released in DVD and VOD across North America in October 2010, to an underwhelmed response.
By this stage McNab had completed principal photography on his second film, ‘The Gingerbread Men’. Described (for legal reasons) as being ‘loosely-inspired-by-but-not-an-adaptation-of’ J. P. Donleavy’s novel ‘The Ginger Man’, McNab began work on the script the day after he finished his final college exams in 2007, and eventually filmed it in summer 2010. Featuring approximately 30 speaking roles, it is his largest production to date, but was filmed on a similar micro-budget to ‘The Farm’. The film screened at two festivals in 2012, but failed to secure a distribution deal, and was self-released in January 2013.
Still undeterred, McNab began production on his third film, ‘The Three Sisters’, in July 2012. Resolving not to plough all his available money into a film yet again, this film had a budget of around half the previous two. It was filmed in bits and pieces over a two year period, using an eight page treatment rather than a conventional script, with the story being refined as he filmed. Marking a return to the thriller/horror genre, the film guest stars genre legend Giovanni Lombardo Radice (‘Cannibal Ferox’, ‘City of the Living Dead’, ‘Gangs of New York’) and premiered at the Horror-on-Sea Festival in the UK. An official soundtrack album was released in mid-2015, and the film went on to screen at several Irish festivals, and was released on DVD and VOD across North America in 2017.
The same year saw the release of the 'Grindsploitation' trilogy of fake trailers, inspired (belatedly) by the fake trailers which played around the main features in Quentin Tarantino and Robert Rodriguez's 'Grindhouse' project in 2007. McNab's contribution, a trailer for a film-that-doesn't-exist called 'The Samurai Motorcycle Horror Gang', was one of the few trailers in the project that wasn't absolute dogshit.
His fourth, and, best, feature film is comedy-drama 'The Last Roll', which will premiere in 2020.
Future projects include a Spanish language western called ‘Mexican Stand-Off’, a dark thriller/character study called ‘The Detective’, and a dogme film. He is also a published author, placing mystery stories in North American magazines under a pseudonym.
As this handsome youngish tyro continues to fly ever higher in his pursuit of excellence, flanked by his growing flock of magnificent films, nothing can stop him reaching his stated goal of ‘Extreme Artistic Excellence’ apart from the limits of the cinematic medium, premature death, and the stupidity of festival programmers, critics and audiences alike.
