A documentary/drama telling the story of Knock Shrine has won an international film award.

Hope: Our Lady of Knock, directed by Campbell Miller, was named as the best ‘special or documentary’ in the 2020 Gabriel Awards, a contest organised by the Catholic Press Association to honour works that support themes of dignity, compassion, community and justice.

Hope: Our Lady of Knock examines how the town became a focal point of pilgrimage, visited by over a million people every year.

The film features contributions from relatives of the original witnesses of the apparition in 1879, as well as Fr Richard Gibbons, the current Knock parish priest, Archbishop of Armagh Eamon Martin and Knock historian Tom Neary. It also includes an interview with Marion Carroll, who was healed from a serious illness while on pilgrimage at Knock.

Campbell Miller, who is from Newcastle, Co Down, is the first Irish director to win a Gabriel Award. Earlier this year, he presented a copy of the film to Pope Francis.