Belfast: 10 Films About Irish History | Screen Rant
Kenneth Branagh's BAFTA-winning Belfast offers a unique glimpse into life as a child raised during the Troubles in Northern Ireland. Starring Jamie Dornan and Caitriona Balfe, it is the latest in a long list of films that depict significant historical events in Ireland both retrospectively and as they happened.
From famine, revolution, and conflict to the jazz and post-punk scenes of the 1980s, there are few historical stones left unturned by filmmakers of the '90s and beyond. But if there are some cinephiles who have become interested in the culture, they might want to take a look at a few of these motion pictures.
The bleakest year of the Irish Potato famine follows the story of a soldier who abandons his post in the British Army to reunite with his family. Upon his return, it is revealed that his mother died of starvation and his brother had been killed. After also witnessing his nephew murdered and his remaining family members die of exposure following an eviction, Martin Feeney (James Frecheville) seeks to avenge them by murdering those he blames for their deaths.
The film’s narrative is political; it focuses on the consequences of colonialism and constitutional negligence while brutally depicting the horrors endured by its victims. The tone is best summarised in a hard-hitting line spoken by Private Hobson (Barry Keoghan): "Everyone's dying of hunger and they're putting food on a boat."
One of Liam Neeson's most vengeful characters is Michael Collins in this biopic about the Irish revolutionary’s involvement in the Easter Rising and the Irish War of Independence, concluding with his death in 1922. Released in 1996, the film comes 80 years after the events depicted in its opening.
Critic Patrick Nabarro describes it as “Irish history Hollywoodised.” Indeed, the man is mythologized to an extent in this condensed but comprehensive dramatized depiction of one of the most significant figures in the history of Ireland’s fight for independence.
Ken Loach’s war drama takes place during the Irish War of Independence and the Irish Civil War that immediately followed. Cillian Murphy and Pádraic Delaney play two brothers from County Cork who join the Irish Republican Army to help fight for Ireland’s independence from the United Kingdom.
The film takes its name from the 19th-century ballad by Robert Dwyer Joyce about the Irish Rebellion of 1798. It refers to the barley that grew from the unmarked graves of rebels, reflecting the regenerative nature of Irish resistance to British oppression; a nature that is also reflected by the film’s release nearly a century after the events it depicts and in the aftermath of the Troubles.
Kenneth Branagh’s Belfast is a semi-autobiographical coming-of-age drama, set at the start of the Troubles in Northern Ireland. The film opens with the August 1969 riots, where a group of Protestant loyalists attacks Catholic homes and businesses. From then on, the political tensions are kept to the forefront and are told through the experiences of child protagonist Buddy (Jude Hill).
The film is stylistically shot in black and white to reflect the rainy grey backdrop of Branagh’s childhood memories. It is a move that has been praised by critics for laying Belfast's engaging characters bare and amplifying their emotions. Despite encompassing themes, such as conflict, grief, and upheaval, Belfast is an oddly feel-good film that offers a unique perspective on life during this turbulent time in Irish history.
The events of '71 take place at the height of the Troubles in Belfast. Skins star Jack O'Connell plays Gary Hook, a British soldier who becomes separated from his unit during a riot. In this intense historical thriller, audiences experience the conflict from an outside perspective and bear witness to the conflicted consciousnesses of its characters.
Although the events are fictional, they are rooted in reality and pay close attention to historical detail, leading critics to praise the film for its emotional authenticity and political acuity.
The Guildford Four were wrongly accused and convicted for attacks orchestrated by the Provisional IRA at several London pubs in 1974. The film focuses on Gerry Conlon (a dedicated performance by Daniel Day-Lewis) and unfurls over fifteen years, detailing the events leading up to his wrongful arrest, his life in prison, his campaign for justice, and his eventual release.
Alongside offering a factual account of historical events, the film dissects the relationship between Conlon and his father (Pete Postlethwaite), who also serves prison time and subsequently passes away before his innocence is proven. Despite their complicated history, it is his father’s death that spurs Conlon to continue the campaign that he started.
By the creators of In the Name of the Father, the Helen Mirren-led Some Mother’s Son echoes the themes of its predecessor. John Lynch, who previously starred as one of the Guildford Four, portrays Bobby Sands - the IRA prisoner who famously organized a hunger strike in 1981.
It re-tells the story of Sands’ protest against his treatment as a criminal, rather than as a prisoner of war, from the perspective of two strikers’ mothers. Mirren mirrors the maternal conflict faced by women when forced to decide between love and loyalty, and life and death.
The events in the coming-of-age musical Sing Street are influenced by the recession that hit Dublin in the 1980s. Conor (Ferdia Walsh-Peelo) starts a band to escape the stresses of home and school life as well as to attract an aspiring model, for whom he pens the infectious “The Riddle of the Model” and the heart-warming “Up”.
It has unsurprisingly been compared to Alan Parker’s The Commitments, though the soundtrack is influenced by the New-Wave, Post-Punk, and Synthpop scenes of the '80s rather than Jazz. The film is unique in that it explores a niche aspect of Irish history that is overlooked in other films set during this era.
Based on the Roddy Doyle novel published four years earlier in 1987, The Commitments is less a film about Irish history and more one that captures it as it happens. It is a quintessential late '80s/early '90s comedy that tells the story of Jimmy Rabbitte (Robert Arkins), who forms a soul group made up entirely of working-class musicians.
The music drives the plot; outside of the soundtrack, the film isn’t particularly outspoken, though Rabbitte reveals that he relates to soul music as a North Dubliner due to feeling alienated by his city, country, and continent.
While not strictly historiographical, Calm With Horses is a reflection of the accumulated socio-economic and cultural trauma as depicted by the films that precede it. It is a crime drama, set in a fictional town in rural Ireland. It follows Arm (Cosmo Jarvis), an ex-boxer-come-enforcer who works for a criminal family whilst caring for his son, who has autism.
Like The Commitments, it is adapted from literature and is based on a short story from Colin Barrett’s collection Young Skins (2015). Also like The Commitments, despite not being a period piece, it captures a moment in history as it is happening. Give it a few more years and Calm With Horses will become another artifact in a time capsule of films depicting Irish history.