The FrontLine

In this hard-hitting emotional thriller, the outwardly unassuming Joe Yumba (Eriq Ebouaney – Kingdom of Heaven) fights for his life and the lives of those close to him when he is forced to take part in a hazardous bank heist under the command of ruthless gangster Eddie Gilroy (James Frain, The Tudors).

Tearing through the streets of Dublin in a desperate attempt to escape ferocious felons, relentless detectives and raging gunshots, he will stop at nothing to save a child and guard his true identity. 

Kings

The story of a group of friends who emigrated to England in the late ’70s promising to return to Ireland rich and successful. Now 25 years on, only one of them is going home, Jackie whose body was found on the railway, crushed by a passing train. It is when his friends are forced to confront the possibility it was no accident, but suicide, that they must face up to the bitter chill of truth.

Small Engine Repair

Doug, an aspiring country singer in his forties, has spent his life as a loser in a non-descript small town, where nobody believes in his heartbreaking voice and talent as a musician. When the last of his music pupils deserts him, Doug is forced to face up to the fact that his music career is going nowhere.

Only his best friend Bill, a macho small engine repair man, has any faith in Doug’s talent; Doug’s wife Agnes gave up on him years ago. When Burley, their volatile friend who’s just got out of prison for a hit and run, shows up in town again, he takes the only other job that Doug could do, forklift driver at the local plant. Doug has hit rock-bottom but with the help of Bill and local bar owner Big Eddy, Doug is handed one last chance to show he can make to the big time. . . A quiet self-assured debut feature from newcomer Niall Heery.

Once

Once is a modern-day musical. Set on the streets of Dublin, it features eight songs by Glen Hansard – of Irish band The Frames – who also stars in the film. Once tells the story of a busker and an immigrant who fall in love over an eventful week, as they write, rehearse and record a number of songs.

Essentially a mood piece, Once is an attempt to make an unselfconscious musical which will appeal to a more modern audience. The use of actual musicians over professional actors, real locations, and a free-form camera and editing style, lends a refreshing element of realism to a genre which contemporary viewers can often find hard to stomach.

Hansard’s music already has a huge following in Ireland and abroad, and the intention of Once was to make a kind of visual album, set against the backdrop of a fast-changing city. At its heart the film is a simple, classic story of two artists falling in love.

Eden

Eden is the screen adaptation of Eugene O’ Brien’s internationally acclaimed, award-winning play.

In a modern middle-class town in Ireland, Billy and Breda Farrell (Aidan Kelly and Eileen Walsh) reflect on their lives together on the eve of their tenth wedding anniversary. Breda is determined to re-ignite the passion between them, while Billy becomes increasingly obsessed with an attractive younger woman. Featuring a breakthrough performance by Eileen Walsh, EDEN is a tenderly observed portrait of two lives at a crossroads, and a very human struggle to honour the promise to live, learn and love together.