Irish Film Institute -International Film Directory

The First was a Boy

Shaun Dunne, 10 minutes, 2019

Set in the heart of Dublin's ever-changing Ringsend, this experimental film explores the special bonds between grandparents and grandchildren, grief and ageing.

Belfast’s New Lodge is a Catholic neighbourhood violently affected by the Troubles. Many of the men who live here engaged in paramilitary activity in their youth and now suffer from disillusionment, unemployment, and poor mental health. The women work to…

Flea Ceoil

Louis Marcus, 23 minutes, 1967

A tribute to the ‘Fleadh’ – a traditional Irish music festival – Louis Marcus’ film was made in the town of Kilrush in Co. Clare in 1967, at the peak of the 1960s resurgence of Ireland’s musical traditions. This intimately…

Fortune’s Wheel

Joe Lee, 76minutes, 2015

Fortune’s Wheel brings to life the remarkable, implausible story of a Fairview lion-tamer in Dublin in the 1950s. Bill Stephens was an ordinary young Dubliner, with an extraordinary dream – to become a skilled animal trainer and a big circus star.…

Freagairt na Gairme

Martin Danneels, 85 minutes, 2025

Freagairt na Gairme (Answering the Call) is a contemplative documentary that follows the fragile survival of Ireland’s corncrake, one of the country’s most endangered birds. Set against the windswept beauty of the Atlantic coast, the film traces the efforts of…

From That Small Island

90 minutes, 2025

[IFI International: details pending]

FROM THE VAULTS: RED MIST + Q&A

Éamon Little,

Few Irish people will ever forget Saipan, May 2002 and the biggest ever bust-up in Irish soccer. But how many knew what actually happened on that tiny island in the Pacific? How did it come to pass that captain and…

The Funeral Director

Gillian Marsh, 82 minutes, 2020

Gillian Marsh's portrait of David McGowan, a Sligo funeral director, confronts the business of death and how it is ritualised within Irish society, where we are known to grieve better than anyone else. With unprecedented access to the procedures, science…

Further Beyond

Christine Molloy
Joe Lawlor, 89 minutes, 2016

In their documentary debut Christine Molloy and Joe Lawlor take as their point of departure the compelling 18th Century figure Ambrose O’Higgins (father of Bernardo O’Higgins, the first leader of independent Chile) and attempt to retrace his remarkable journey from…

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