Irish Film Institute -International Film Directory – Film Listing

Blue Road – The Edna O’Brien Story

    • Director

      Sinéad O'Shea

    • Credits

      Producers:
      Eleanor Emptage,
      Clare McCabe,
      Sinéad O'Shea.

      Cinematographer:
      Richard Kendrick

      Writer:
      Sinéad O'Shea

    • Principal Cast

      Jessie Buckley,
      Declan Conlon,
      Gabriel Byrne

  • Category

    Documentary
    F-Rated
    Literature

In 1960, a young Irish woman named Edna O’Brien wrote The Country Girls, the first of a sexually-frank trilogy of novels. Though the books were banned in Ireland, O’Brien became an international literary sensation, gaining fame and notoriety through her marriage and acrimonious divorce from Ernest Gebler; publications in the New Yorker and the creation of screenplays for British and US cinema. She lived in London with her two sons where she hosted star-studded parties and conducted numerous love affairs. Her later work was inspired, at times controversially, by real life events.

This documentary portrait, completed shortly before her death last year, features extracts from her journals (read with verve by Jessie Buckley), contributions from Gabriel Byrne, Anne Enright and other luminaries, and a remarkable final interview with Edna, now aged 93 as she reflects with dignity and candour on her extraordinary life.

Notes by Sunniva O’Flynn

Awards:
+ Best Documentary, Dublin Film Critics Circle Awards 2025
+ Best New Irish Feature, Cork International Film Festival 2024

100 minutes, Ireland, 2024, Colour

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