Documentaries

Passionately filmed for two years with no budget, Saviours is the moving debut feature film by Ross Whitaker and Liam Nolan. The film is an intimate, gripping documentary following three young boxers from the same Dublin boxing club, St. Saviours Olympic Boxing Academy. The club is a safe haven amongst the dangerous flats of Dublin's north inner city. There, under the guidance of the club's canny coaches, the three boxers fight for a better life both inside and outside the ring.

This film is a musical journey to the heart of Africa with acclaimed Irish musicians Liam O’Maonlaí (The Hothouse Flowers) and Paddy Keenan (The Bothy Band) as they travel thousands of miles through Mali, West Africa. Along their journey they meet and collaborate with musicians ranging from Grammy award winners to nomadic herders, culminating in a unique performance in the world’s most remote music festival – ‘Festival au Desert’.

Directed by: Dearbhla Glynn
Produced by: Vanessa Gildea
Music: Liam O’Maonlaí, Paddy Keenan, Afel Bocoum & Alkibar, Toumani Diabaté, Tinariwen, Ali Farka Touré.
Production company: Luachra Productions

An elegant elegiac film on Thomas Lynch, who’s family-run funeral parlour business provided Oscar winning writer Alan Ball with the key to writing the hit HBO series Six Feet Under. An undertaker with over 30 years experience the theme of death dominates Lynch's work, yet his writing lacks the morose and melancholy nature that one might assume inherent in such a topic. Instead, Lynch's writing is rich in passion, humour and an undeniable logic. For him it is only through dealing with death that we can truly get on with the business of living.

Produced by: James Mitchell/ Aisling Ahmed
Script: Philip Davison/ Cathal Black
Photography: Tim Fleming

A frank, funny and intensely moving portrait of 85-year-old Irish film auteur George Morrison, maker of Mise Éire and Saoirse?, the definitive cinematic histories of 20th Century Ireland.

In Waiting for the Light, Director Cıarín Scott uncovers his work, his life and loves in frank and intimate interviews. We see his triumphs and his long years of failure, his passion for film, his obsessive perfectionism, and his great personal charm and humour.

Director/Producer/Writer: Ciarín Scott
Photography: Stephen O’Reilly
Editor: Lawrence Fee

Made in the town of Kilrush in County Clare , Fleá Ceoil captures the resurgence of interest in traditional Irish music in the 1960s when Irish folk singers like Dolly McMahon, who appears in the film, were seen as part of world-wide boom in folk music.

Beautifully filmed by Bob Monks, Fleá Ceoil is remarkable in its close attention to the small details that distinguish this vibrant musical community. The film was directed by Cork-born Louis Marcus, one of Ireland ’s most important and prolific documentary directors. It won a Silver Bear at the Berlin Film Festival and other prestigious awards in Russia, Spain and Belgium.

O'Donoghue's Opera' is Ireland’s first musical film. A mock opera made in 1965 which ran into financial difficulties before it was properly completed—but has since gathered cult status. Extraordinarily, it remained unseen until veteran filmmaker Tom Hayes brought the out-takes to Sé Merry Doyle who oversaw its painstakingly restoration.

The hilarious film stars Ronnie Drew and his band of bohemian merrymakers, The Dubliners. Based on the ballad 'The Night That Larry Was Stretched', sung by a young Johnny Moynihan, Drew finds himself caught in a hangman's noose as a reward for his dubious career as ‘the best burglar in all Ireland’. This tongue-in-cheek film has the flavour of an Irish Spaghetti Western and captures the spirit of Dublin camaraderie like no other work before or since: the Guinness, the music, the wit and the grit, it’s all there in abundance.