St. Therese of Lisieux

'St . Therese of Lisieux” is a documentary of the 2001 Irish tour of the Relics of the saint, more commonly known as “The Little Flower”. Over the course of twelve weeks, 3,000,000 people turned out to venerate the Relics in 80 different venues around Ireland. This documentary tells the story from the point of view of both the people on the ground and the tour organisers. From the start, the tour generated intense national debate and, despite those who saw the tour as nothing but a PR exercise for the Roman Catholic Church, an institution plagued by a series of abuse scandals, the public response to the tour was phenomenal with an estimated 75% of the population visiting the Relics. 'With this film we wanted to show another side to Ireland in 2001 – an older side which hadn't got a look-in for some time but which raised its head unashamedly during the tour – and to shoot it in a style not usually employed when dealing with such subject matter. We wanted to take this pilgrimage, more often associated with an older, more conservative following and make it more accessible to a younger, unconverted audience. To do this we shot it with a hand-held camera, edited it in a fast-paced style to tell an old story in a new, engaging way'.