Category Archives: Irish Film

Balfe for A LONG WINTER

Balfe for A LONG WINTER

Irish Film

Balfe for A LONG WINTER

Irish cinema may be about to get a second act worth waiting for. Caitríona Balfe is leading a new adaptation of Colm Tóibín’s work, A LONG WINTER, which arrives in cinemas in January 2027. It is drawn from Tóibín’s 2006 short story of the same name, part of his collection Mothers and Sons, and it puts Balfe in the role of Louise, a mother at the centre of this stark and intimate drama.

Tóibín’s name carries real weight at the box office and with awards voters. BROOKLYN took in more than €62 million worldwide and collected three Oscar nominations, so the bar for any new screen version of his writing is high. If A LONG WINTER can match even a fraction of that emotional pull, audiences are in for something special.

Balfe won’t be carrying it alone. Kit Connor joins her as Tommy, Fred Hechinger plays Mike, and Martin Freeman rounds out a cast that gives the film real star power alongside its literary pedigree. The production also looks to be as striking as the story is quiet. Cinematographer André Turpin shot the film, which is said to treat the brutal, expansive winter wasteland as a living character in its own right. The cast and crew travelled to the wilds of Calgary, Canada, filming in the same mountainous region that gave us THE REVENANT. Few landscapes feel so unforgiving, which makes it a fitting backdrop for a story about a family facing its own long, cold season.

Between Tóibín’s storytelling, a cast at the top of its game and a setting that looks almost too beautiful to be real, A LONG WINTER is shaping up as one of the most anticipated Irish literary adaptations in years. Mark January 2027 in your diaries.

Instagram Youtube

Irish Film

Meaney in RE-CREATION

Meaney in RE-CREATION

Irish Film

Meaney in RE-CREATION

Few actors of Colm Meaney’s vintage are still choosing material as boldly as he is, and RE-CREATION may be the clearest proof. Written and directed by Jim Sheridan and David Merriman, the film puts twelve jurors in a room and asks them to decide whether British journalist Ian Bailey killed French filmmaker Sophie Toscan Du Plantier in 1996. Meaney plays Bailey, though only in the opening and closing scenes, which makes it a striking choice. He is the man at the centre of the story, yet the film belongs to the debate, and his restraint is part of the point. The project is openly modelled on 12 ANGRY MEN, right down to the jurors experimenting with the murder weapon, and it never hands the audience a verdict. Based on real events, it reconstructs a notorious case through argument alone and trusts viewers to reach their own conclusions. For an actor best known to Irish audiences as the working-class father of THE COMMITMENTS, THE SNAPPER and THE VAN, that is a long way from the comfort zone.

It also fits a pattern. Meaney has spent the last few years saying yes to stories with moral weight and a bit of risk, from BRING THEM DOWN to IN THE LAND OF SAINTS AND SINNERS, and earlier he earned an IFTA for playing Martin McGuinness in THE JOURNEY. In 2025 he added SAFE HARBOR and THE PANIC to the list alongside RE-CREATION, and he took home the IFTA Lifetime Achievement Award the same year. Awards like that tend to invite a victory lap. Meaney seems to prefer a shot at something new. Next comes REMARKABLY BRIGHT CREATURES, a Netflix adaptation directed by Olivia Newman, a warmer and more mainstream turn that shows how wide his range still runs.

What ties these choices together is trust: in directors, in difficult material, and in audiences who can sit with an uncomfortable question. Sheridan, who also appears as the jury foreman, called Meaney and co-star Aidan Gillen “two icons of Irish cinema”, and RE-CREATION shows why. Meaney does not need the spotlight to hold a film together. Sometimes the most powerful thing a veteran can do is step back, let the story do the work, and leave the audience to argue it out on the way home.

Instagram Youtube

Irish Film

THE SPIRIT OF RORY at CIFF

THE SPIRIT OF RORY at CIFF

Irish Film

THE SPIRIT OF RORY at CIFF

Rory Gallagher, the Ballyshannon-born, Cork-raised guitar legend, is about to take centre stage once more, and this time it’s on the big screen. The 2026 Cork International Film Festival, running from 12 to 22 November, will host the world premiere of JOE BONAMASSA: THE SPIRIT OF RORY, a new documentary that traces one American guitarist’s lifelong devotion to the man who shaped his sound. It’s a fitting tribute to an artist whose influence has never faded, and the festival is clearly proud to give it a home in the city Gallagher grew up in.

The film follows Bonamassa to Ireland in the summer of 2025, when he travelled to perform Gallagher’s celebrated Irish Tour ’74 set in full, marking thirty years since the great man’s death. Live concert footage sits alongside candid conversations with fellow Gallagher disciples, among them Queen’s Brian May and Guns N’ Roses’ Slash, whose admiration for Rory reveals just how far his reach extended beyond the island where he was born.

The premiere takes place at Cork’s Everyman Theatre on Wednesday, 18 November, and the evening won’t end when the credits roll. Rory’s brother Dónal Gallagher will join a Q&A afterwards, alongside what organisers are teasing as “a special guest”, a tantalising promise that will have fans guessing until the night itself.

Instagram Youtube

Irish Film

GLADIATOR 2 now on Netflix

GLADIATOR 2 now on Netflix

Irish Film

GLADIATOR 2 now on Netflix

GLADIATOR II, Ridley Scott’s long-awaited follow-up to GLADIATOR, the 2000 epic that took home the Academy Award for Best Picture, is heading to Netflix after a release in 2024 that left audiences, critics, and reportedly even Scott himself divided.

Mescal takes the lead as Lucius Verus Aurelius, the son of Marcus Aurelius, the emperor played by Russell Crowe in the original film. He is joined by a stacked supporting cast that includes Denzel Washington, known for MALCOLM X and GLORY, Pedro Pascal of GAME OF THRONES and THE LAST OF US, Connie Nielsen, who returns after GLADIATOR and appears in NOBODY, and Quinn, whose credits include STRANGER THINGS and FANTASTIC FOUR: FIRST STEPS. Paramount’s official synopsis frames the story as a continuation of the saga of power, intrigue, and vengeance in Ancient Rome. Years after watching the revered Maximus fall at the hands of his uncle, Lucius is dragged into the Colosseum when his home is conquered by tyrannical emperors who rule Rome with an iron fist, and with rage in his heart and the empire’s future at stake, he must look to his past to find the strength and honor to restore Rome’s glory to its people.

Instagram Youtube

Irish Film

Murphy for 28 YEARS LATER 3

Murphy for 28 YEARS LATER 3

Irish Film

Murphy for 28 YEARS LATER 3

Danny Boyle has delivered the news that fans of the infected world have been hoping for: the third chapter of the saga is happening, Alex Garland has already written the script, and Cillian Murphy is set to play a major part in it. Speaking at the Zurich Film Festival, Boyle said he’s confident the film will get made, even if he can’t say exactly when cameras will start rolling. In his words, the project, whether it ends up called 28 YEARS 3 or something else entirely, will happen because people keep asking about it, and the script Garland has produced is a very good one.

Then came the detail that should have longtime devotees buzzing. Boyle promised there will be a lot of Murphy in the film, while joking that he doesn’t know whether the actor will be stripping down again, given that he now has an Oscar to his name.

It’s a thrilling prospect when you remember where all of this began. Murphy played Jim in Boyle’s 2002 horror classic 28 DAYS LATER, waking from a coma to find Britain devastated by the Rage Virus. Jim was our eyes and ears in that terrifying new reality, and his journey helped make the film one of the defining horror pictures of its era.

Boyle even had a funny memory of shooting that film, admitting he was caught completely off guard by Murphy’s physique. He recalled being unable to believe what he was seeing, likening the young actor to Iggy Pop, all glistening and effortless, a man who doesn’t work out and simply looks that way.

What excites me most is the chance to see Murphy properly return to the role. Jim is the beating heart of this franchise, and after everything this world has endured, I’m fascinated to see how the intervening years have shaped him. What kind of man is he now? What has he had to do to survive? How much of the person we met in 28 DAYS LATER is still in there? We caught a small taste of that in 28 YEARS LATER: THE BONE TEMPLE, but this next film has the room to explore him fully.

There’s a rich history tied to Jim, and reconnecting with him could give the ending real emotional weight, bringing the whole story full circle to the character who started it all.

Instagram Youtube

Irish Film

Brosnan’s path to success

Brosnan's path to success

Irish Film

Brosnan's path to success

Pierce Brosnan has a clear view of what it takes to work as an actor: you have to let yourself feel. The 73-year-old Irish-born star, who defined James Bond for a generation in the 1990s and 2000s, has been reflecting on his craft in a new conversation with Interview magazine. He says that being aware and present within yourself, and allowing the emotions to come, is the foundation of the job. As he describes it, acting is a constant cycle of constructing and destroying a part of yourself in order to become the character, investigating who you are and placing yourself in a particular moment in time.

Brosnan is just as candid about the role that made him a global name. He acknowledges that Bond changed his life and that he remains instantly identifiable with the character all these years later. Rather than resisting that, he calls it the gift that keeps giving, crediting the franchise with the career he has today and with leading him to roles like the one in his latest project, MOBLAND. His advice is to make peace with the association, embrace it and celebrate it, then look for work that truly pushes you.

MOBLAND is a good example of that approach. The crime drama brings Brosnan together with Tom Hardy, Mandeep Dhillon and Dame Helen Mirren, a cast that shows how far he has moved beyond the tuxedo while still carrying the screen presence that made him a star. For fans of Irish talent on the world stage, it is a reminder that longevity comes from honesty, openness and a willingness to keep challenging yourself.

Instagram Youtube

Irish Film

MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG update

MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG update

Irish Film

MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG update

Richard Linklater has never been a filmmaker in a hurry, but his latest update on MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG shows just how far he is willing to stretch the definition of patience. The director, who began shooting the project with Paul Mescal back in 2019, says it still has a very long road ahead, and by his own estimate the finished film will take eight years longer to complete than BOYHOOD, the landmark drama that took twelve years to make and became a modern classic.

The reveal came during an interview with Zurich Film Festival CEO Christian Jungen, when an audience member asked Linklater where things stood. His answer was equal parts progress report and punchline. He explained that the plan is to shoot nine sections across twenty years, with the fourth section set to begin filming in just a few months, and then signed off with a cheerful “see you in 2040.” Coming from anyone else, that might sound like a threat. From Linklater, it sounds like a promise.

What makes the situation particularly amusing to him is the contrast with his earlier experiment. BOYHOOD, he pointed out, was made in near total secrecy, so nobody was waiting on updates or asking when it might arrive. This time, the stakes of visibility are entirely different. Because the project is a Stephen Sondheim musical and therefore very much in the public eye, he joked that he has to field the same question for two full decades while the film is being made.

The story itself feels perfectly suited to such an unusual method. Told in reverse chronological order, MERRILY WE ROLL ALONG follows Franklin Shepard, a Broadway composer who walks away from his art and his friendships to become a wealthy, cynical Hollywood producer. A tale about how time reshapes ambition and erodes the bonds we once thought unbreakable seems made for a production that will itself unfold over the better part of a lifetime, and if Linklater’s track record is any guide, the wait may well prove worthwhile.

Instagram Youtube

Irish Film

ELSINORE trailer released

ELSINORE trailer released

Irish Film

ELSINORE trailer released

The first official trailer for ELSINORE has arrived, and it’s a striking introduction to a film that has already been winning hearts on the festival circuit. Andrew Scott leads as the late actor Ian Charleson, and the footage suggests a performance of rare intensity and vulnerability.

Directed by Simon Stone, whose previous work includes THE DIG, and written by Stephen Beresford of PRIDE, the film is inspired by Charleson’s remarkable life and, in particular, the extraordinary pressure he faced while preparing to play Hamlet at the National Theatre in London. The official synopsis calls it a powerful, deeply moving and inspiring true story about an actor confronting incredible odds in pursuit of the performance of his life.

Early reaction from the fall festivals suggests the film delivers on that promise. Deadline’s Pete Hammond called Scott’s work “heartbreakingly great” and a “performance for the ages,” high praise that places him firmly in the awards conversation. Olivia Colman stars alongside him, and Scott also serves as a producer on the project, which speaks to just how personal this one is for him.

ELSINORE screens next at the London Film Festival, before StudioCanal brings it to Irish/UK cinemas on January 29, 2027. American audiences won’t have to wait nearly as long, as Focus holds the U.S. rights and will open the film on November 20. If the trailer and the early buzz are anything to go by, this is one to mark in the calendar.

Instagram Youtube

Irish Film