With the departure of the Irish Film Board's chief executive and film productions 'thin on the ground', where do we go from here, asks Hugh Linehan

'Ireland org's topper ankles for Ausfilm." Deciphering the pidgin English found in the pages of Variety, the international movie industry's in-house journal, can be a real chore sometimes.

But it mirrors the often oblique language and Byzantine financial mechanisms by which films get funded and made. In case you're wondering, the sentence above reported the decision by chief executive of the Irish Film Board Mark Woods to return to Australia after only 18 months in the job.

The announcement three weeks ago of 34-year-old Woods's departure to head up Australia's film promotion agency, Ausfilm, may have come as a surprise to some, but others were aware that for some time he had been unhappy in the Film Board job. It's notable that in his resignation statement he described his time at the IFB with one adjective: "unforgettable", which could, one surmises, be read in a number of different ways.

"The words were carefully chosen," says Woods, who, though born and educated in Ireland, has spent most of his adult life working as a film industry journalist and executive in Australia. "It was very memorable, being thrown into an Oireachtas hearing within six weeks [ of taking the job]. I have compressed into two years what a lot of my Australian peers would have experienced over five years."

It's true, certainly, that Woods took up the position at one of those periodic fraught moments which afflict the film industry here. A decision was pending on whether to scrap the tax incentive for film production, Section 481, which, if it had gone the wrong way would, many felt, have led to the end of film-making as a viable activity here. But since the resolution of the tax incentive issue to the satisfaction of the local industry, there had been increasing rumours that Woods was unhappy in the job and was seeking an early exit. Following the announcement of his resignation, a further article in Variety, headlined "Split stirs Irish stew" stirred things up nicely.

"Wanted: a new CEO for the Irish Film Board," Variety announced. "Must be willing to work for peanuts, put up with abuse from all sides, oh, and live in Galway." According to the article, the Galway location of the IFB was one of the issues that "drove Woods to quit the job".

"The Galway HQ issue sums up the conflict at the heart of the Irish film community," said Variety, "torn between a small-town mentality and the desire of an increasingly impressive cadre of young film-makers to take on the world. Officially, all the IFB's 17 employees are based in this hippyish student town on the west coast, four hours away from Dublin and the industry they are supposed to serve - and even further from the key sources of international co-finance. In reality, half work mostly out of the org's 'Dublin meeting room', and live in the capital. But no one is allowed to admit it publicly."

Does the outgoing chief executive recognise this description of his job and its difficulties? "I recognise a journalist's desire to have a good line," says Woods, who was himself a Variety writer for several years. "I'm not in a position to comment on the location, but asking where people put their heads down at night is invasive. I'm not going to be drawn into a debate on it. However, it's true to say that locating a national film agency outside the capital city is manifestly a challenge. You'd be hard-pressed to find any other European country whose film agency was outside its capital or its most populous city."

James Morris, the chairman of the IFB, also refuses to be drawn on the Galway issue. "It's not really a concern to serious professionals in the industry," he says in what could be interpreted as a barbed comment on the vociferous pro-Galway lobby. "The board has been really strong on regional development - I don't think it matters very much."

Having been appointed as chairman of a new board only a few months ago by Minister for Arts, Sports and Tourism John O'Donoghue, Morris now finds himself searching for a new chief executive. But, asked whether Woods's premature departure has been a blow to the IFB, he replies emphatically. "No, it's not. And I would say the same thing in any similar situation. The job Mark is going to is a great opportunity for him. I want to put on record that he has left a legacy of change which was much needed. It has been streamlined to communicate with everybody in the industry."

Woods will leave in August and the IFB will be meeting shortly to draw up specifications for advertising the job of chief executive. "I think it will be an attractive position," says Morris. "More attractive than it was two years ago."

Morris doesn't believe the Variety report, with its less-than-glowing description of the job and its specifications, will unduly hinder the search for a replacement. "The film industry always gets strong opinions," he says drily.

Woods himself does not necessarily agree that the chief executive's job, which is benchmarked to Assistant Principal Officer grade in the civil service, is particularly badly paid. "One does not retire on the proceeds of working in the public service," he says. "But I'd say if you benchmarked it to other agencies, it's not ungenerous."

What about reports that he was taken aback by the pressure and (some say) abuse which came with the job? His response is opaque: "When you run a public service agency, you are uniquely accountable to all your stakeholders." Well, how does Ireland compare with Australia in terms of the level of vitriol? "The rules of engagement do differ from territory to territory." And what of the suggestion that he was, to put it mildly, not enjoying himself? "I am proud of being in some way part of putting [ the IFB] on a firmer footing. I did derive satisfaction from it, because I came in to do that."

He points out that he will have been in the job for two years by the time he leaves. "There's no question that it's a bit ahead of schedule. But these opportunities come up rarely, especially when they're in your home town."

According to Woods, the IFB had been left "in good shape" by his predecessor, Rod Stoneman, who resigned after 10 years at the helm to take over the running of the new Huston School of Film and Digital Media at NUI Galway. "But I wanted to build on that, to create new programmes." As examples, he cites the Regional Film and TV Fund, which aims to encourage audiovisual production in the BMW region, the Documenting the Arts Fund, which provides funding jointly with the Arts Council towards the production of five or six documentaries per year that "examine, in an exciting way, the diverse issues of art and culture in a contemporary or historical context", and a revolving pre-production cashflow fund, intended to bridge the financial shortfall which often afflicts productions in the crucial period before final contracts are signed. "It's a problem which has bedevilled lots of productions."

So what sort of shape is the Irish film industry in at the moment? The IFB's remit includes both the co-financing of indigenous films and the promotion of Ireland as a location for international productions.

"Incoming productions are thin on the ground," James Morris acknowledges. Unfavourable exchange rates against the US dollar and increasing competition from tax incentives in other countries are cited as key reasons, but Woods also believes that industrial relations issues here are dissuading incoming productions, particularly the absence of a clear and transparent ratecard which lays out labour costs and work practices. "One thing is sure; this country needs a ratecard," he says. "Other things can flow from that. It should include an agreement on work practices that are competitive but are not a race to the bottom."

There has been some controversy over the board's policy on Irish productions. In an article in Film Ireland magazine, film-maker Liz Gill accused the IFB under Woods of being obsessed with sales agents (who market and sell films on the international market) and distribution companies. If a project did not have an agent or distributor on board, it was suggested, it stood little chance of receiving funding from the IFB. As a consequence, Woods was merely giving an Irish rubberstamp to projects which had already been accepted in the international marketplace, rather than supporting innovative or more risky projects which were unlikely to get such pre-approval.

"It amuses me that I'm considered market-driven," says Woods, who came to the IFB after several years as head of acquisitions and investment at the 24-hour film channels, Showtime and Encore, where he was involved in the company's investments in 29 Australian films, including the award-winning Rabbit-Proof Fence, Somersault and Japanese Story. "In my last job I was considered to be the screaming arthouse person down the corridor. Was there more prominence given to end users during my tenure? I would have to say yes. I expressed some unease about the IFB being the only ones who sit there telling you if your film is any good or not."

He makes no apology for the policy, "if it means using public money in ways that are accountable, that films would be released, that films would be seen internationally . . . so you can look taxpayers in the eye and say that people believed in that movie. No decision-making process is perfect, but it has to be accountable. We need to be able to say when we make these decisions that they've been made in a transparent and accountable way."

Woods points out that the IFB only puts in a maximum of 25 per cent of a film's budget. "What sets us apart from agencies in other countries is we're only putting in that 25 per cent as compared to their 50 or 60 per cent." In addition, he says, those other countries also often have "soft money" available from local television, an option not available in Ireland.

What Gill and some of her peers have been most critical of is the apparent winding down of the IFB's low-budget initiative, which provided a much higher percentage of the overall budget to indigenous films made for €1 million or less. The initiative allowed many Irish film-makers to get their projects off the ground without spending several years hawking their wares, usually unsuccessfully, around the international marketplace, and was responsible for films such as Adam and Paul, Goldfish Memory and Cowboys and Angels seeing the light of day.

"The low-budget initiative is still there," insists Woods. "We had two low-budget movies go into production this year. People compare that with some previous years, but those years were unusual. You need to have a balanced slate of different kinds of films."

He points to a recent experience when visiting the set of Studs, Paul Mercier's film which was shot under the terms of the initiative. "Technicians would tell me that it was great to work on these films, but they wouldn't want to be working on them all the time and trying to pay their mortgages."

In truth, these are the same tensions - indigenous versus international; creative versus commercial, low-budget versus big-budget - which have always characterised debates around film financing in Ireland (and, indeed, most other places). It's all a question of balance and emphasis. "It's not about big, fat box office," says Woods, who mentions a range of films, from Neil Jordan's Breakfast on Pluto to Studs and the Traveller drama Pavee Lackeen as examples of those supported during his tenure.

So what now for the IFB? With a new board and, soon, a new chief executive in place, is major change on the agenda, or is a period of consolidation more important? "There's lots of work to do," says Morris. "Our purpose is to support the Irish film industry, to develop talents and skills. It's not our role to throw everything out and start again. But you have to think very hard about how you can create the circumstances that allow talent to get out there."