Best Irish drama movies

In a dystopian near future, single people, according to the laws of The City, are taken to The Hotel, where they are obliged to find a romantic partner in forty-five days or are transformed into animals and sent off into The Woods.

Dr. Steven Murphy is a renowned cardiovascular surgeon who presides over a spotless household with his wife and two children. Lurking at the margins of his idyllic suburban existence is Martin, a fatherless teen who insinuates himself into the doctor's life in gradually unsettling ways.

A boy growing up in Dublin during the 1980s escapes his strained family life by starting a band to impress the mysterious girl he likes.

A small-time Belfast thief, Gerry Conlon, is wrongly convicted of an IRA bombing in London, along with his father and friends, and spends 15 years in prison fighting to prove his innocence.

A vacuum repairman moonlights as a street musician and hopes for his big break. One day a Czech immigrant, who earns a living selling flowers, approaches him with the news that she is also an aspiring singer-songwriter. The pair decide to collaborate, and the songs that they compose reflect the story of their blossoming love.

A young wannabe musician discovers he has bitten off more than he can chew when he joins an eccentric pop band led by the mysterious and enigmatic Frank.

In the dark heart of a sprawling, anonymous city, two assassins carry out a sinister mission, a teacher battles a fatal illness, and an enigmatic janitor and a curious waitress lead dangerous double lives. Murderous consequences unravel in the dead of night, as their lives intertwine at the hands of a mysterious criminal mastermind who is hell-bent on revenge.

Residents of a coastal town learn, with deadly consequences, the secret shared by the two mysterious women who have sought refuge at a local resort.

After being threatened during a confession, a good-natured priest must battle the dark forces closing in around him.

Haunted by her past, a nurse travels from England to a remote Irish village in 1862 to investigate a young girl's supposedly miraculous fast.

In a small Midwestern town, a troubled teen with homicidal tendencies must hunt down and destroy a supernatural killer while keeping his own inner demons at bay.

The story of Bobby Sands, the IRA member who led the 1981 hunger strike during The Troubles in which Irish Republican prisoners tried to win political status.

In 1985, while working as a coal merchant to support his family, Bill Furlong discovers disturbing secrets kept by the local convent and uncovers truths of his own; forcing him to confront his past and the complicit silence of a small Irish town controlled by the Catholic Church.

In a time of starvation, a survivalist lives off a small plot of land hidden deep in forest. When two women seeking food and shelter discover his farm, he finds his existence threatened.

No one expects much from Christy Brown, a boy with cerebral palsy born into a working-class Irish family. Though Christy is a spastic quadriplegic and essentially paralyzed, a miraculous event occurs when, at the age of 5, he demonstrates control of his left foot by using chalk to scrawl a word on the floor. With the help of his steely mother — and no shortage of grit and determination — Christy overcomes his infirmity to become a painter, poet and author.

From Jane Austen’s novella, the beautiful and cunning Lady Susan Vernon visits the estate of her in-laws to wait out colorful rumors of her dalliances and to find husbands for herself and her daughter. Two young men, handsome Reginald DeCourcy and wealthy Sir James Martin, severely complicate her plans.

In 1920s Ireland young doctor Damien O'Donovan prepares to depart for a new job in a London hospital. As he says his goodbyes at a friend's farm, British Black and Tans arrive, and a young man is killed. Damien joins his brother Teddy in the Irish Republican Army, but political events are soon set in motion that tear the brothers apart.

Jimmy Rabbitte, just a thick-ya out of school, gets a brilliant idea: to put a soul band together in Barrytown, his slum home in north Dublin. First he needs musicians and singers: things slowly start to click when he finds three fine-voiced females virtually in his back yard, a lead singer (Deco) at a wedding, and, responding to his ad, an aging trumpet player, Joey "The Lips" Fagan.

A music-mad 16-year-old outcast at a rugby-mad boarding school forms an unlikely friendship with his dashing new roommate.

When fate brings Belfast teacher JJ into the orbit of self-confessed "low life scum" Naoise and Liam Óg, the needle drops on a hip-hop act like no other. Rapping in their native Irish, they lead a movement to save their mother tongue.

A quiet, neglected girl is sent away from her dysfunctional family to live with relatives for the summer. She blossoms in their care, but in this house where there are meant to be no secrets, she discovers one.

In 1847, when Ireland is in the grip of the Great Famine that has ravaged the country for two long years, Feeney, a hardened Irish Ranger who has been fighting for the British Army abroad, returns home to reunite with his estranged family, only to discover the cruelest reality, a black land where death reigns.

For Jip, Lulu, Koop, Nina and Moff, the dead-end jobs they endure during the week just kill the time until Friday night. That's when they cut very loose and get on the rollercoaster ride that takes them right through to Monday morning.

What happens when the undead return to life? In a world ravaged for years by a virus that turns the infected into zombie-like cannibals, a cure is at last found and the wrenching process of reintegrating the survivors back into society begins.

Single mom Flora is at a loss about what to do with her rebellious teenage son, Max. Her efforts to keep him out of trouble lead to a beat-up acoustic guitar, a washed-up LA musician, and harmony for this frayed Dublin family.

Michael Collins plays a crucial role in the establishment of the Irish Free State in the 1920s, but becomes vilified by those hoping to create a completely independent Irish republic.

A British spy is banished to Panama after having an affair with an ambassador's mistress. Once there he makes connection with a local tailor with a nefarious past and connections to all of the top political and gangster figures in Panama. The tailor also has a wife, who works for the Panamanian president and a huge debt. The mission is to learn what the President intends to do with the Canal.

Jealousy flares after the headmistress of an elite boarding school for girls becomes obsessed with a new student.

Albert Nobbs struggles to survive in late 19th century Ireland, where women aren't encouraged to be independent. Posing as a man, so she can work as a butler in Dublin's most posh hotel, Albert meets a handsome painter and looks to escape the lie she has been living.

Headstrong farmer Rosemary Muldoon has her heart set on winning her neighbour Anthony Reilly's love. The problem is, Anthony seems to have inherited a family curse, and remains oblivious to his beautiful admirer. Stung by his father's plans to sell the family farm to his American nephew, Anthony is jolted into pursuing his dreams.

The dramatised story of the Irish civil rights protest march on January 30 1972 which ended in a massacre by British troops.

Eddie and Amber decide to stage a relationship in order to stop everyone speculating about their sexuality. Eddie is keen to follow his dad into the military, while Amber dreams of moving to the liberal hub of London. The plan seems solid, but as their arrangement begins to fall apart, Eddie’s denial gets deeper as Amber realizes that a perilous future awaits her best friend unless she intervenes.

Three young Irish women struggle to maintain their spirits while they endure dehumanizing abuse as inmates of a Magdalene Sisters Asylum.

Sarah and David are single strangers who meet at a mutual friend’s wedding and soon, through a surprising twist of fate, find themselves on a funny, fantastical, sweeping adventure together where they get to re-live important moments from their respective pasts, illuminating how they got to where they are in the present... and possibly getting a chance to alter their futures.

Over one intense day, the devoted head teacher of a last-chance reform school strives to keep his students in line while facing pressures of his own.

Newly arrived to a remote desert town, Catherine and Matthew are tormented by a suspicion when their two teenage children mysteriously vanish.

In the 1970s, a young transgender woman called “Kitten” leaves her small Irish town for London in search of love, acceptance, and her long-lost mother.

For her entire life, the cult she was born into has been all that teenage Selah has known. Along with a band of similarly cloistered young women she lives seemingly unstuck in time, cut off from modern society in a remote forest commune presided over by a man called Shepherd, a controlling, messiah-like figure with a frightening dark side. But when her insular world is rocked by a series of nightmarish visions and disturbing revelations, Selah begins to question everything about her existence—including her allegiance to the increasingly dangerous Shepherd.

A family of Irish immigrants adjusts to life on the mean streets of Hell's Kitchen while also grieving the death of a child.

A young woman's penchant for sensational Gothic novels leads to misunderstandings in the matters of the heart.

An Irish Catholic family returns to 1930s Limerick after a child's death in America. The unemployed I.R.A. veteran father struggles with poverty, prejudice, and alcoholism as the family endures harsh slum conditions.

In darkest rural Ireland, ex-boxer Douglas 'Arm' Armstrong has become the feared enforcer for the drug-dealing Devers family, whilst also trying to be a good father to his autistic five-year-old son, Jack. Torn between these two families, Arm's loyalties are truly tested when he is asked to kill for the first time.

Overwhelmed by grief following the death of his wife, Donnelly shares a train carriage home with a troubled young man identified only as the 'Kid'. As the Kid becomes more agitated and foul-mouthed, the journey takes on a violent and dangerous hue – for the bereaved Donnelly and for other hapless passengers on the train. Academy Award Winner: Best Live Action Short Film – 2005

Inspired by the true events of the infamous 1983 prison breakout of 38 IRA prisoners from HMP Maze, which was to become the biggest prison escape in Europe since World War II.

Nineteen-year-old Danny Flynn is imprisoned for his involvement with the I.R.A. in Belfast. He leaves behind his family and his sixteen-year-old girlfriend, Maggie Hamill. Fourteen years later, Danny is released from prison and returns to his old working class neighborhood to resume his life as a boxer.

An old gangster is advised that Freddie Mays would leave jail after thirty years in prison. His mood changes and he recalls when he was a young punk and who joined Freddie's gang—a man he both envied and ultimately betrayed.

Michael is a 24-year-old who has cerebral palsy and long-term resident of the Carrigmore Residential Home for the Disabled, run by the formidable Eileen. His life is transformed when the maverick Rory O'Shea moves in.

When she fails to meet an item on his list of requirements for a bride, Julia Thistlewaite is jilted by London’s most eligible bachelor, Mr. Malcolm. Feeling humiliated and determined to exact revenge, she convinces her friend Selina Dalton to play the role of his ideal match. Soon, Mr. Malcolm wonders whether he’s found the perfect woman...or the perfect hoax.

When the ongoing rivalry between farmers Michael and Jack suddenly escalates, it triggers a chain of events that take increasingly violent and devastating turns, leaving both families permanently altered.

The story of former Ulster Volunteer Force member Alistair Little. Twenty-five years after Little killed Joe Griffin's brother, the media arrange an auspicious meeting between the two.

A drama based on Jimi Hendrix's life as he left New York City for London, where his career took off.

When Queen Victoria's husband Prince Albert dies, she finds solace in her trusted servant, Mr. John Brown. But their relationship also brings scandal and turmoil to the monarchy.

A solitary nurse bonds with a badly burned patient who survived an accident on an oil rig.

Struggling to provide her daughters with a safe, happy home, Sandra decides to build one - from scratch. Using all her ingenuity to make her ambitious dream a reality, Sandra draws together a community to lend a helping hand to build her house and ultimately recover her own sense of self.

Socialite Vita Sackville-West and literary icon Virginia Woolf run in different circles in 1920s London. Despite the odds, the two forge an unconventional affair, set against the backdrop of their own strikingly contemporary marriages.

Sussex, England, 1938. Shortly before the outbreak of World War II, Thomasina and Martha Hanbury, two ingenious sisters, create LOLA, a miraculous machine.

Chronically agoraphobic since the day his wife was murdered, Tommy Cowley finds himself terrorized by a gang of syringe-wielding feral children, who are intent on taking his baby daughter. Upon discovering the nightmarish truth surrounding these hooded children, he learns that to be free of his fears, he must finally face the demons of his past and enter the one place he fears the most - the abandoned tower block, known as the Citadel.

A raucous story of the interweaving lives and loves of small-town delinquents, shady cops, pretty good girls and very bad boys. With Irish guts and grit, lives collide, preconceptions shatter and romance is tested to the extreme. An ill-timed and poorly executed couple's break-up sets off a chain of events affecting everyone in town.

The story of music legend Terri Hooley, a key figure in Belfast's punk rock scene. Hooley founded the Good Vibrations store from which a record label sprung, representing bands such as The Undertones, Rudi and The Outcasts.

Jacob, a man who believes he is a wolf trapped in a human body, is sent to a clinic by his family where he is forced to undergo increasingly extreme forms of "curative" therapies at the hands of The Zookeeper. Jacob’s only solace is the enigmatic Wildcat, with whom he roams the hospital in the dead of night. The two form an improbable friendship that develops into infatuation.

Jimmy Gralton returns from New York and reopens his beloved community hall, only to meet opposition from the local parish.

On assignment while photographing a female suicide bomber in Kabul, Rebecca – one of the world’s top war photojournalists - gets badly hurt. Back home, another bomb drops as her husband and daughters give her an ultimatum: her work or her family.

Emily finds herself disconnected from the world around her. She goes on a journey through her memories and relives different moments from her life. Emily must look to her past so that she may fully embrace the present.

In rural Northern Ireland, following the untimely death of their mother, a young man with Down syndrome and his estranged brother discover her unfulfilled bucket list.

A family in financial crisis is forced to sell Lassie, their beloved dog. Hundreds of miles away from her true family, Lassie escapes and sets out on a journey home.

A gangster named Perrier looks to exact his revenge on a trio of fugitives responsible for the accidental death of one of his cronies.