THE world premiere of the Whisky Galore! remake will be held at this year’s Edinburgh International Film Festival (EIFF), it has been announced.
Shot entirely in Scotland, the new version of the much-loved comedy has been selected for the closing night.
Making the announcement yesterday, EIFF artistic director Mark Adams said: “We are absolutely delighted to be staging the world premiere of Whisky Galore! as closing night of this year’s festival. It is a delightful adaptation of a much-loved classic and will wrap up our 70th edition in memorable style.”
Inspired by the real life wreck of the SS Politician near Eriskay, in the Outer Hebrides, Whisky Galore! originally hit cinemas in 1949.
The Ealing comedy, which starred A-listers of the day including Basil Radford and Joan Greenwood, followed a novel of the same name by Sir Compton Mackenzie and tells the story of the islanders’ attempts to hold on to the spilled cargo of whisky in defiance of authorities.
The black-and-white movie was shot on Barra by Glasgow director Alexander Mackendrick, who called Radford’s character, English official Captain Paul Waggett, the “most Scottish” of the piece.
In the new version, he will be portrayed by comedian Eddie Izzard, who leads a cast that also boasts homegrown talent including Gregor Fisher, James Cosmo and Kevin Guthrie, who appeared in the acclaimed adaptation of Lewis Grassic Gibbon novel Sunset Song.
Updated by award-winning screenwriter Peter McDougall, whose previous work includes Jimmy Boyle biopic A Sense of Freedom, the latest version was shot in locations including Aberdeenshire village Portsoy and Ardeer Beach in North Ayrshire.
Audiences will get their first taste of the finished product as the EIFF ends on Sunday, June 26, with tickets on sale from 10am today.
Gillies Mackinnon, who previously worked with Izzard on BBC wartime drama Castles in the Sky, said: “I am delighted that Whisky Galore! will close the Edinburgh International Film Festival. This feels like the perfect and most appropriate world premiere for a film which is the remake of a Scottish film classic.”
Producer Iain Maclean added: “I remember watching the film many times, as a child growing up on the Hebrides. It’s wonderful to bring Sir Compton Mackenzie’s story about whisky and the islanders to a new generation of film fans through this year’s EIFF.”
Established in 1947 – the same year Mackenzie’s novel was published – the EIFF prides itself on being “intimate in its scale, ambitious in its scope, and fuelled by pure passion for cinema”.
In recent years the programme has included the premieres of films including Kathryn Bigelow’s Oscar-winning The Hurt Locker, dance favourite Billy Elliot and Disney Pixar blockbuster Brave.
The EIFF starts on Wednesday, June 15, and includes a screening of ET with orchestral accompaniment, a retrospective of comic book adaptations and a focus on Finnish works.
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