Following a decade’s worth of award-winning shorts, Glaswegian director Peter Mackie Burns made his fiction feature debut in 2017 with Daphne, a lauded character study concerning a pessimistic and hedonistic young woman (Emily Beecham) living in south London and undergoing an existential crisis after witnessing a stabbing. 

Second feature Rialto, supported by the BFI Film Fund, sees the director collaborating with writer Mark O’Halloran and heading to Dublin. Colm (Tom Vaughan-Lawlor) is a married dock worker with 2 teenage children. Still grieving the death of his destructive father, and with his job threatened by a recent takeover, he struggles to share his vulnerability with wife Clare (Monica Dolan). Where he finds solace, while threatening his family’s stability, is in his encounters and growing infatuation with Jay (Tom Glynn-Carney), a 19-year-old who intermittently works in prostitution.

Speaking to us at the Glasgow Film Festival in February, Mackie Burns discussed his tips for second feature success…

Full interview for the BFI