Michael Flatley directorial debut Blackbird finally ready for release – The Hollywood Reporter

Michael Flatley directorial debut Blackbird finally ready for release – The Hollywood Reporter

A film that had almost developed a cult following after effectively disappearing after its smashing world premiere has – finally – been given a release date.

Blackbirdthe directorial debut of the famous king of the dance front man and Riverdance legend Michael Flatley heads to cinemas in Ireland with Wildcard Distribution. The September 2 release date comes nearly four years after the film had its glitzy world premiere at London’s Raindance Film Festival on September 28, 2018, a premiere that was famous for excluding journalists and producing zero reviews or reactions from the public on Twitter.

Around the time of its premiere, the film – an old-fashioned thriller directed, written, produced and financed by Flatley, who also stars as the titular Blackbirda James Bond-esque ex-spy living in the Caribbean who is being pulled out of retirement — got quite a fling in the British press, thanks in large part to a somewhat tone-deaf poster featuring an assortment of glamorous bikini-clad, uncredited women alongside the older and credited male stars, including Eric Roberts and Patrick Bergin. In an interview with The Hollywood Reporter for the screeningFlatley said he had nothing to do with the posters, also hitting back on any question that the film was a vanity project, claiming that he had received “multiple offers” from people to buy the film.

But then everything went quiet, requests to see the film were turned down and the story of… BlackbirdHis whereabouts, much like Flatley’s spy at the center of the plot, became something of a mystery. Over the next few years, a growing legion of devoted movie fans and those who were simply curious to see what had happened to Blackbird would take to social media to call for his release.

Those prayers, at least for those in Ireland, have finally been answered.

In a tweet on Thursday, Wildcard, one of Ireland’s most successful independent distributors, revealed it would be releasing Blackbird in local cinemas on September 2. The company also released a trailer that was awash with beaches, sports cars, attractive women, spies with pistols, and blood-stained white tuxedos, all part of the many reasons the film garnered such a following in the first place.

“The Blackbird is dead,” Flatley says in the clip. It’s not anymore.