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The Forgotten Maggies

Added on June 29, 2009

Monday July 29th 2009

By Trish O'Dea



A WOMAN who was torn away from her unmarried mother at two and sent to a childrens' home where she was routinely beaten because of the circumstances of her birth is among the unforgettable contributors to a new documentary by a first-time filmmaker from Millstreet.

The truly shocking and harrowing paths followed by four women after they left Cork's Magdalene laundries and tried to obtain recognition and redress is charted in The Forgotten Maggies, which will premiere at the Galway Film Festival on July 8th.

The film-maker is 25-year-old Stephen O'Riordan, who was overwhelmed by Peter Mullins' award-winning film The Magdalene Sisters. However, he felt, as he watched the brief précis of 'what happened next' at the end of the movie, that "there was no way in the world those women rode off into the sunset and lived happily ever after; not after what happened to them".

And so began a three-and-a-half year trek around Ireland and England gathering these stories and working with the women to make a stand against a redress board which, in one case, flatly refused to believe the woman's account of her treatment in one of the Magdalene Laundries.

Stephen is reluctant to release too much detail before the premiere but the documentary is set to be explosive. The content focuses on what happened after the women left the laundries and brings their stories right up to date with Stephen and his colleagues Gerard Boland and Seamus Hegarty drawn into their fight for justice.

Stephen began with just one contact and brought Gerard and Seamus on board by advertising on the IFTN (Irish Film & Television Network) website for cameramen and/or researchers for a voluntary project. He was also greatly assisted by Elaine Hooper, also from Millstreet, who became an adviser, sounding-board and confidante.

It was all done on a shoestring and edited at Gerard's house and all of them ultimately gave up three and a half years of their lives to get it finished. Stephen admits that, during the process "I felt ashamed to be Irish".

One of the women featured was charged €3,000 by a solicitor who wrote three letters on her behalf and failed to obtain even a hearing from the redress board; another was married for 38 years before her husband died. She never told him what had happened to her.

Every woman TD in Ireland has been invited to the premiere at the Town Hall Cinemobile at 10am on July 8th and Stephen believes that they should be there; that women in power in Ireland have to stand up and say enough is enough and secure for the 30,000 women who went through the Magdalene Laundries the apology they so richly deserve.

Stephen, a graduate in film studies, felt enormous pressure to get this right, and he feels he has created an important documentary. "These are four real women and, for all of them, it was their first time coming forward and telling their stories. We really want to get their voices heard."

Stephen was motivated to try and make a difference, in part, because of his inspirational sister Joanne O'Riordan, who was born without arms and legs and who leads a full and active life. Joanne, 13, has just completed her first year of secondary school at Millstreet Community College.

The last person admitted to a Magdalene Laundry went in in 1991 and the last laundry was closed in 1996. Their legacy, however, lives on. Stephen believes: "These women need redress and need a state apology for the injustice they have suffered."



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XCIwIj5cgl8

You can use the above link to see a short trailer of the film.


Many thanks, Look forward to seeing the women there.


Speak Soon,

Steven O' Riordan
003532971444 00353870674520

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