The 2025 Dublin International Film Festival begins this week, and for Irish filmmakers it’s a huge platform to share their work, and in the festival’s expansive offering of shorts there is an impressive variety of filmmaking approaches and outlooks from across the island. No more is that more on display than in the immersive, intelligent and emotional latest short film from Irish director Tara O’Callaghan, which screens as part of the DIFF VM Discovers strand of short films this week.
Debuting this week at DIFF, No Time Wasters marks Tara’s debut in narrative films, following the success of her documentary short Call Me Mommy across the festival circuit in 2022. The doc won Best Short Documentary at the Galway Film Fleadh 2022, the Audience Choice Award at the IFI Film Festival 2022, received an IFTA nomination, and was nominated for best documentary short at Sundance 2023.
The Motherland member is developing a reputation for tackling taboos with an unflinching empathy, and her first fiction looks at a very real issue with that same compassionate eye, exploring the harsh realities of sex-for-rent exploitation – a widespread and deeply troubling issue in Ireland that continues to be overlooked and unaddressed. Featuring performances from rising talent Ellie Mejia alongside experienced performers, the IFTA nominated Peter Coonan (King Frankie, Love/Hate, Hidden Assets) and Grainne Keenan (The Foreigner, Black Mirror, The Night Caller), No Time Wasters looks at a character put into a position faced by many in modern Ireland; the loss of a home, the quiet manipulations and the weight of survival, as Ellie Mejia’s Marianne is pulled into a world where the lines between kindness and exploitation dangerously blur, forcing her to confront what she’ll sacrifice to survive. Confronting the quiet manipulations of sex-for-rent exploitation, Marianne navigates a world that preys on vulnerability. No Time Wasters is a raw and unflinching portrait of survival, capturing the fragile moments where resilience is pushed to its limits.
Sex-for-rent exploitation has become a deeply troubling issue both in Ireland and abroad, while other countries have introduced legislation to address it, Ireland still lacks any protections for the most vulnerable in our society. As one of the harshest consequences of our housing crisis, it preys on those already struggling, forcing individuals – particularly women – into impossible choices between survival and exploitation. No Time Wasters sheds light on this stark reality, calling for immediate action to protect those at risk and hold perpetrators accountable.
We spoke with Tara to explore the issues that inspired the film, the insights that built it, and the expansion of her work that No Time Wasters represents.
You wrote the script for No Time Wasters as well as directing it, is that a new experience for you?
Back when I went to the National Film School, I studied narrative directing there and so I wrote my grad film, but it’s a completely different environment when you’re in college to being in the world. I took a bit of a break from narrative, I wanted to explore music videos and documentaries. After the last couple of years of that, I just felt just ready to put some words on paper.
No Time Wasters is about sex-for-rent exploitation, which we saw in the news last year following the National Women’s Council report on the prevalence of that exploitation in Ireland.
Was the short something that sprung out following from that, or were these ideas that you had been considering from even further back?
It was actually a direct result to the reports that were coming out. I just was quite shocked that something like that was happening here, I didn’t really think that was possible. I felt like it was an issue that was going in and out of the public consciousness. Everyone was talking about it one minute and then all of a sudden it would disappear, you’re left going, what’s going on here, there’s no legislation, there’s no protection.
I also found a lot of confusion and stigma around sex for rent and I’m not really surprised it’s gone away because it’s affecting the most vulnerable people, people who are quite marginalised. That really then propelled me into thinking I really need to know more about this. What’s going on? How come this isn’t being spoken about anymore? That was the beginning of the journey of the film.
Coming from your last short Call Me Mommy where you were in communication and working so closely with sex workers, was there a gap that you could see in people’s understanding when it comes to issues like this? It still seems like an issue that isn’t given the weight that it should be.
Absolutely it’s not. I found from the research that I had done that a lot of people really see this as a form of prostitution. It’s not really understood that this is happening to incredibly vulnerable people. A lot of what I’ve seen is just focusing on the landlords and what they’re doing, and I don’t think people really see it as exploitation. That shocked me. I was looking on forums and looking for different films I could find on the topic and the attitude was like sure look, they’re getting a good deal, they’re basically prostitutes, there was a disconnect of understanding how people could potentially get involved in something like sex for rent.
The performances really helped to communicate the story that you’re trying to tell. We feel the discomfort in Ellie’s performance, we feel so uncomfortable watching Peter and Grainne. Working in narrative for the first time, how do you work with actors to draw out those performances to best serve this story?
I really think it goes back to working in documentary for me, at the core of everything I like to do is that it has to feel authentic. If I don’t believe it, I don’t feel it. I was in very safe hands with Ellie, Peter and Grainne, they were absolutely incredible, they just embodied the characters in such a powerful way, but also we really didn’t have a lot of time to workshop this script. I was in the middle of a couple of other quite intense projects, so the first time we saw the characters come alive was very much on set. Seeing the script that I wrote come alive in the space, it’s completely different to when you’re sat at home on your computer writing it out in the laptop, so I think for me it was about giving them the control over their characters and having them really input on what felt natural and real for their characters.
Allowing them to do that with the script brought everything to a new level, they just had so many brilliant ideas that we incorporated. In the last scenes in particular, I was really conscious of how we were going to build the tension, what was the best way to play their performances to get to that temperature? So I got them each to play their characters, especially towards the end of the film in three different ways. That was hugely beneficial when we got to the edit so we could slowly raise that temperature, pull it back, whatever way fit the story the best.
When you were at that screenwriting stage with the film, particularly coming from documentary, what was it like working in in isolation?
It was completely different to what I’ve done before. You really craft your documentary through shooting, through interviews, it’s a completely different process. I almost felt like I was doing it backwards with narrative in a way. It was a solo experience to an extent, I spent a lot of time in my office writing the script. With Call Me Mommy though it was very much me and Sinead, we were just in this constant direct dialogue throughout making the film, whereas with this film I was speaking to a lot of different people, journalists, women who were directly affected and different organizations who dealt with the issue. So I had help in other ways, and it was great to have the team at Motherland as well, they were a great bounce board as we were developing the script to make it as strong as we could.
At Motherland as well there’s experience at weaving between producing docs and narrative. I’m curious, as somebody that is very drawn to telling stories about marginalized and under-served people, do you see yourself going forward as going between those formats depending on what way you want to tell the story?
I don’t really know what the future holds but for me, whatever format that story calls for is the way it should be done. And I think we’re really moving away from those traditional structures of filmmaking where one person’s a narrative director, someone else does documentary. For me, story is king so whatever format best serves that is what I’ll explore. I think as well working in different formats and working across different styles of filmmaking is really exciting and it’s all going to add to whatever projects you do next.
What were the most exciting things that you discovered about yourselves as a director just through the process of making this film?
Honestly, to trust my instincts more, that was a big thing for me. As I said I was in the middle of two projects while making No Time Wasters there was very little time for me to mull over decisions or agonize over things. I was able to really lean on my experience from docs and commercials, that gave me a lot of security. And I really realised how lucky I was to have the team around me that I did. From my previous work I was really able to build a team that I knew I worked well with and we ended up having a lot of fun on set too. It was a really nice atmosphere, and being able to have that feeling of trust was hugely comforting.
We’re still awaiting legislation in this area in Ireland, what measures are most important to respond to this form of exploitation?
I don’t think I have the qualifications to comment on legislation if I’m being perfectly honest, I think that this film is one part of a very big puzzle on this issue. A lot of incredible work has been done by journalists and organizations. They are the people who need to be speaking about what the next steps are for this type of issue.
I think what I’m trying to do here with this film is hopefully understand things from the perspective of someone who has got involved in this kind of situation, to show that this really is a type of exploitation. There is a real misunderstanding about the type of person that gets involved in this, people may have a stereotype attached to it, or they’ve made-up their mind on it. It’s just about opening up that stereotype, or that generalization that I’ve seen.
It’s about widening the perception about what this actually is.
Exactly. I know a couple of journalists have done a lot of great pieces on women who’ve come forward, but again, I found it incredibly hard to find people to talk to about this. There’s a lot of shame and stigma attached to it. And I’ve heard so many stories of women that get sent to the Garda station, who tell them this is not an issue for us, this is a civil court matter. People are being bounced back and forth, they don’t know where to turn, who to talk to, there is a lot of confusion around this. Hopefully we can show the circumstances of this situation, the reality of it, which I don’t think is seen too often.
No Time Wasters screens as part of the VM Discovers Gala at DIFF 2025 on Friday 21st February, 5.15PM. Tickets are sold out but a waiting list is available.