Oscar-longlisted film captures powerful moment someone’s life is changed ‘by seeing a form of artistic expression’. A moving short film currently longlisted for the Academy Awards depicts a test of faith and morals set in a rural Irish village. Clodagh, co-written and directed by Portia A Buckley with her husband and creative partner Michael Lindley, tells the story of Mrs Kelly (Bríd Ní Neachtain), a woman working for the church who also teaches Irish dance to local girls.
![[Bríd Ní Neachtain in ‘Clodagh']](https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/01/10/16/newFile-7.jpg)
One morning she is approached by a single father (Aidan O’Hare), who asks her to take on his daughter, Clodagh (Katelyn Rose Downey), who turns out to be an extraordinary dancer. But a revelation puts Mrs Kelly’s beliefs to the test, as she is forced to choose between what she has been taught is right, and what she feels in her heart.
![[Director and writer Portia A Buckley]](https://static.independent.co.uk/2025/01/10/16/newFile-8.jpg)
Buckley said she and Lindley were inspired to write the story shortly after the birth of their son, after becoming fascinated by the idea of a housekeeper dedicated to her church while “asking for nothing in return – you don’t come across characters like that very often,” she told The Independent.
She added that, in hindsight, she and Lindley realised that they had made a film about a child who “turns someone’s life upside down for the better”, which they themselves were experiencing at the time. One of the most powerful aspects of the film, she said, was to show how “art can change people, and witnessing people who have never changed their lives to be profoundly affected by seeing a form of artistic expression”.
