A Laois movie managed to scoop three awards at the eclectic Underground cinema Short Film festival.
‘Vegetable’ – written by Swan man Michéal Fleming – won Best Horror and Best Make-Up, with Michael Browne taking the honours.
Vegetable star Degnan Geraghty also came away with the Best Supporting Actor award.
To top off the SwanDive production’s success, Vegetable has been selected as part of the Rome Prisma Film Awards this November.
The story broke in July of last year that zombies were roaming the Slieve Bloom mountains – and indeed they were.
‘Vegetable’, which includes a set full of zombies, spent two days in the Glendine woods area of the Slieve Bloom mountains filming.
Michéal explained that the idea for his film while travelling with his ‘better half’ last year.
“We were going around Asia and India and decided to stay away from meat and only eat vegetables. We were doing a lot of travelling and 24-hour train journeys and it popped into our heads that we were like zombies, only eating vegetables,” he said.
“The idea came from that but I didn’t get to write anything until a few months later,” he said.
Having filmed a 1916 short production in Laois, Michéal was keen to return to his native county for filming. “We wanted to show off what Laois has to offer,” he said.
Photographs by a local photographer from the Swan inspired Michéal to choose a location in the Slieve Blooms.
“The photographs looked really eerie, so it was a perfect location for what I wanted,” he said.
Around 25 crew members and actors were involved in the movie.
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