Interning Abroad with Dublin-Based Filmmaker
Gabrielle Wylie-Chaney spent the summer living the life of an artist in Dublin: working on a film, lingering in an art house cinema, attending a film festival, and hosting movie nights with new friends. Gabrielle is a sophomore studying Art History and Italian, with minors in Cinema & Media Studies and Urban Studies.
“This summer I have been interning in Dublin with BU Study Abroad! I am working with Dragana Jurisic, a photographer and filmmaker based in Dublin from Former Yugoslavia. With her, I have been able to work on the beginning research and development phase for a new film project. It has been amazing to learn the ins and outs of working as an artist in a major city. Especially when I have gotten the opportunity to work in studio spaces and The Photo Museum Ireland. During this time I have also frequented the Light House Cinema, a local art house cinema in Smithfield Dublin, and it has almost become a second home. While they are an art house theater that plays a variety of pictures, they regularly feature Irish produced and written films. Many of the Irish based films I saw there were varied in their entertainment value ranging from brilliant to a tad boring. I watched seven films there including, The Watchers (2023), The Sparrow (2023), and That They May Face The Rising Sun (2022). I was able to see new releases like Riddle of Fire (2023), MaXXXine (2024), Longlegs (2024), La Chimera (2023), and Backspot (2023), as a part of the Gaze International Film Festival. I had mixed opinions about each film. I absolutely loved Longlegs, a brilliant new horror which made me never want to see Nick Cage in a movie again, and Backspot, a new queer, happy, sporty film. I didn’t love both MaXXXine and The Watchers to be honest, I felt the plots were very underdeveloped but the production was great. I loved the Sparrow and La Chimera in the same sense, they both had gorgeous imagery and slightly devastating plots. Lastly, That They May Face The Rising Sun was beautiful, if not slightly boring as a slice of life. I also did convince my friends to do many a movie night, which was pretty fun. It was amazing to study here, meet so many cool people, and immerse myself in Irish culture. I maybe watch too many movies but please follow my letterboxd because I think my opinions are pretty funny and kinda smart;
https://letterboxd.com/gabriellewc/.”