GRIEF, mental health and intergenerational trauma combine in Cathy Brady’s emotionally stirring psychological film Wildfire. Set in a fictional border town in present day Northern Ireland, it tells the story of two sisters Lauren (Nora-Jane Noone) and Kelly (Nika McGuigan).
When Kelly, who has been missing for a year, finally returns home, it stirs up long-repressed traumas between the sisters, and their communities.
Together they unearth their mother's past, which was often perched on the edge of suicide, and uncover secrets and resentments which have been buried deep and threaten to overwhelm them.
“Although the film takes a look at a community struggling to overcome its past, most importantly it’s about a family and the relationships within it,” says Newry writer and director Cathy Brady about her debut feature.
“It is very much is a character-driven film which asked you to observe the detail, the nuance, the unspoken and how these characters are behaving."
Unusually the casting for the film happened before she had even written a word – due to her having worked with Noone in her short Wasted and with McGuigan in the RTÉ/BBC3 television series, Can’t Cope, Won’t Cope.
“I was taken aback by their ability to be both vulnerable and fierce and I wondered what would happen if I put them together in a movie. After meeting together I was blown away by their chemistry, and knew I had to create something for them.”
What followed was a process that would span five years.
“It was definitely a very different way of making a film but I definitely feel the bond between them and myself made for a much stronger film,” adds Brady, who is a two-time Irish Film and Television Award winner for her short films Small Change and Morning.
Brady reveals that she took inspiration for Wildfire from the BBC documentary Madness in the Fast Lane, about two sisters who had shared psychosis, a mental illness characterised by defective or lost contact with reality.
“It was quite an existential thing to watch and led myself and the two lead actresses to question what would cause people to behave like that.
“We were lucky enough to receive support from the Wellcome Trust charity that allowed us to work with a researcher and speak to psychiatrists and psychologists as well as to two sisters in their 20s who also had shared psychosis and see at first hand how it manifested and affected their lives.”
Psychosis often derives from a trauma that has occurred in the past and in Wildfire Brady explores how both the sisters and Northern Ireland itself are struggling to emerge from a traumatic past.
She hopes that the film opens up a dialogue about mental health and our attitudes towards vulnerable individuals.
“I want audiences can walk in their shoes and identify with the characters and realise how fragile our perception of reality can be."
In order to set the film in context for an international audience, Brady’s opening scenes included archive footage from our troubled past as well as current new reports about Brexit.
“Being from a border town in Northern Ireland, I really wanted to bring the story back to where I am from,” says Brady, whose other aspiration for Wildfire is that it will shine a light on the unspoken legacy of the Troubles.??“When we started making the film Brexit was unthinkable. Now the film is made we still don’t fully know what is going to happen about the border in terms of trade or how it is going to affect communities.
“The work of the late Lyra McKee highlighted how intergenerational trauma is manifesting itself here, with the highest levels of prescription anti-depressants in the world and soaring suicide rates among ceasefire babies.”
Tragically, midway through post-production on Wildfire, co-lead Nika McGuigan, daughter of former boxer Barry McGuigan, died after a brief but brave battle with cancer, aged just 33.
“It was an incredible shock. I was only halfway through the edits with many more months to go when Nika first got sick and just five weeks later she was gone. We had been on such a roller-coaster together making the film. She was like a sister to me and for her to be suddenly gone was so painful,” says Brady, who had to take some away from the film to process her grief.
“In many ways the film deals with grief and there I was in the edit experiencing the biggest grief of my life.
“It was incredibly raw and at first I couldn’t sit in the edit and see Nika’s face on the screen and hear her voice, knowing she was no longer with us. But I had to return to finish the film because of her talent and also because the story was so important and needed told.”
Just as Nika’s character in Wildfire found solace in freshwater lake swimming, Brady too found that swimming in cold water helped her cope with her grief.
“We were lucky enough to be based in Dun Laoghaire and every morning myself and the editor would run to the sea before starting work. The shock of being in the cold water just gives you so much energy and euphoria.
“For anyone that is going through difficulties I recommend immersing yourself in cold water – it could be a simple as a cold shower,” she adds.
Having made its international debut in the acclaimed Toronto Film Festival, Brady is delighted to share Wildfire with local audiences at this month’s Belfast Film Festival.
Filmed in Belfast, Dublin, Dundalk, Newry and Donegal, the Irish-UK co-production received funding from the BFI, Screen Ireland and Northern Ireland Screen.
“I'm really interested to see how local audiences react to the film and whether they will see a sense of their own communities and their own families within it.”
The Co Down writer and director was honoured for her work at last month’s British Film Festival awards, winning the IWC Schaffhausen Filmmaker Bursary Award.
The prize included £50,000 – the most significant bursary of its kind in the UK film industry.
Brady plans to put the money towards her next film, which will be set in the Amazon jungle.
“I had planned to spend a few months in Peru doing research earlier this year, but Covid made me stand still. This award has helped give me the reassurance to concentrate on my next project, which I’m afraid will have to be from my laptop for now.”
And her advice to budding film-makers?
“Perseverance, passion, belief in yourself and finding people that believe in you, are all a huge part of the jigsaw puzzle of getting your film made.”
“From my first short to my first feature was 10 years. I never thought it would have taken that long but what I would say is that I have made a feature that I’m proud of and that I wouldn't change anything about.”
Wildfire will be screened as part of Belfast Film Festival with both online and public screening events on Tuesday November 24. For tickets and full programme visit Belfastfilmfestival.org
