Mayo director's debut film in cinemas on April 5

ALAN Mulligan’s haunting debut drama, The Limit Of, featuring rising star Laurence O’Fuarain and an IFTA-nominated performance from Sarah Carroll, is set for an Irish cinema release on April 5.

From Mayo brothers Alan Mulligan and producer Anthony Mulligan, alongside producer Tim Palmer (Into The West, Patrick’s Day), The Limit Of premiered to acclaim at the Galway Film Fleadh.

It’s a story rooted in Alan Mulligan’s career as a young banker during the Celtic Tiger years and its crushing aftermath. The film captures the rapacious greed of the financial world and society’s ever-growing need for control.

Mulligan’s slow, deliberate style builds a fever pitch of intensity as the film reaches its shocking climax.

James Allen (Laurence O'Fuarain - Black 47, Vikings) is a successful, controlling, thirty-something banker living alone and working in Dublin city at the tail end of the recession. When a family tragedy occurs due to the ruthlessness of his employer, he takes decisive action to try to make things right.

Meanwhile, his enigmatic co-worker Alison (IFTA Best Actress-nominated Sarah Carroll) has her own agenda, which puts her on a collision course with James, triggering and a dark spiral of deceit, revenge, and murder.

Director Alan Mulligan said: “'When I first started writing this film I was feeling limited in my life by the choices I had made. Limited by my career, my financial burdens, my desires and even by who I loved.

“I hope this film speaks to people who may feel limited or lost at the moment. We are in a manipulative world where banks push loans as a way of achieving a certain idea of success for the ordinary person but as the film explores, debt and greed can ruin relationships and be as dangerous as cigarettes to our health.”

Producer Tim Palmer of Ignition Film Productions said: “It is rare to see a first time director having such a stylistic vision and the film has a very European feel to it. But one of the things that attracted me to the project is there is a sense of genuinely not knowing what was going to happen next – or who it was going to happen to! That is very rare.”

Robert McCann Finn of Sentioar, the film’s distributor, said: “We’re delighted to see the Mulligan brothers’ stunning feature debut coming to cinemas. Making a full feature on a tiny budget like this takes real grit and determination, and to achieve the buzz and acclaim they have despite some pretty serious setbacks - including producer Anthony Mulligan’s successful fight against brain cancer and their need to care for their late father who succumbed to the same illness in January is a truly remarkable achievement.”