Synopsis
- Frank Ned McCafferty, a 72 year-old bachelor farmer living alone in a remote part of Northwest Donegal in Ireland, thinks his days of dirty laundry, unwashed dishes and cold dinners are over with the unexpected arrival of Lizzie Donegan, a travelling saleswoman from Bridgend, fifty miles away. Lizzie ‘adopts’ Frank and starts to clean his house, cook for him, keep him company and treat him as one of her family. Frank has no immediate family of his own to leave his 60 acre farm to, and so when Lizzie arrives on the scene, the neighbours think the motives of ‘Busy Lizzie’ are less than pure. Director Neasa Ní Chianáin spent 18 months making this well-observed, intimate and ultimately hilarious documentary film about a charming, old man facing the loneliness of the later years of his life, and his strange and complex relationship with his housekeeper and his neighbours.
Crew
- Director: Neasa Ni Chianain
- Director of photography: Neasa Ní Chianáin
- Editor (Cut): Una Ní Dhonghaile
- Producer: David Rane
- Sound editor: Reto Stamm
- Production company: Vinegar Hill Productions
Awards
- (2004) Best Feature Documentary, Dundee
- (2004) 2nd Prize Audience Award, Dublin
- (2004) 3rd Prize Best Documentary, Galway
Festivals
- (2004) Celtic Film Festival, Dundee
- (2004) Galway Film Fleadh, Galway
- (2004) Stranger Than Fiction, Dublin
- (2004) Foyle Film Festival, Derry
