last updated: 16 June 2019
Diarmuid Lynch - Óglach Dearmadta
Diarmuid Lynch - The Forgotten Volunteer Forefront Productions - TG4 2016 Ciara Hyland produced this documentary commission for the Irish language television station TG4 on the life of Diarmuid Lynch. Based on the book "Diarmuid Lynch: A Forgotten Patriot" by Eileen McGough and produced by Forefront Productions, this film was first broadcast on TG4 Ireland on Easter Monday, March 28, 2016. An Irish language program (with English subtitles) featuring interviews with author Eileen McGough, relatives of Diarmuid Lynch and drama-documentary recreations of events. To read more on the production and behind the scenes of this documentary, click here. |
The Irish Revolution
RTE & University College Cork 2019. Narated by Cillian Murphy. The story of Ireland’s pursuit of independence is an old one which needs retelling for a new generation. The Irish Revolution - a three-part documentary orginally broadcast on RTE in February 2019 covers events of those tumultuous years between 1912 and 1923. The first part tells the story of how a group of young revolutionaries who came of age in the first two decades of the 20th century changed Irish and British history forever. The second and third episodes deal with the War of Independence 1919-21 and its bitter aftermath. The series uses archive footage, contemporary interviews and drone footage. A key new element in the documentary series is the animated graphics based on the bestselling Atlas of the Irish Revolution, arguably the Irish publishing phenomenon of the past decade. |
The Story of Ireland
presented by Fergal Keane - BBC 2011 The Story of Ireland is a five-part documentary series examining the history of Ireland and its impact on the wider world. Over the course of these programmes, Fergal Keane travels across three continents, tracing the events, the people and the influences that shaped modern Ireland. The series aims to explore Irish history using the historical facts and evidence while charting the origin and impact of the numerous myths that have been passed off as history in the past. Key to this approach is relating developments in Ireland to events and changes in Europe and the world at large as the centuries progress The first episode aired on RTE & BBC: 20 February 2011. |
Ireland: A Television History
presented by Robert Kee - BBC/RTE 1980 This highly acclaimed series first broadcast in 1980 follows Ireland's complex history through the island's development from pre-Christian times, to various uprisings down the centuries, explains the famine of 1845, the 1916 Rising, the struggle for Independence from Britain and the island's history up to the late 1970s with an emphasis on the creation of the modern independent republic and the roots of the Troubles. |
The Irish in America: Long Journey Home.
PBS United States 1998 Six million dollars to make over two years with a soundtrack by the Chieftains, Elvis Costello, Sinead O’Connor and Van Morrison. This documentary follows the Irish from the first wave of famine emigrants, to middle class respectability, and the election of John F Kennedy using rare photographs, illustrations and interviews. Billed as the history of the Irish in America from an American perspective and aimed primarily at the 44 million Americans who claim direct descent. The 1998 premiere on PBS attracted over ten million viewers. “Looks and feels like a labor of love” New York Times. “The filmmaker is a consummate story-teller” The Boston Globe were just two of the reviews. The series went on to win a Grammy award 1998 and 'Best Folk Album of the Year' 1998. |
Seven Ages - The Irish State 1922-1995
RTE & BBC Northern Ireland. 2000. Seven Ages is a historical documentary series that was produced by Araby Productions, in association with The O'Reilly Foundation, for RTÉ and BBC Northern Ireland. It charts the birth, growth and development of the Irish state since its foundation in 1921. The series was produced and directed by Seán Ó Mórdha, and the music was composed by Bill Whelan. It was first broadcast in 2000. |
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Michael Collins - The Inteligence War in Dublin
RTE 2007 - Hidden History series The documentary tells the story of how Collins – an obscure Volunteer officer in 1916 – established himself at the top of the Republican Movement just a few years later. As Minister of Finance, he controlled the emerging government's purse strings. And as Director of Intelligence, Collins found the perfect weapon with which to take on the British Empire: information. Operating from an anonymous office in Crow Street, in the shadow of Dublin Castle, Collins’ men established a network of spies and informers at the heart of the British administration. |
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Eamon de Valera.
RTE. 2007 Hidden History series This documentary discusses the relationship between the then Irish and British leaders, Eamon de Valera and Winston Churchill. An always turbulent one. It began with the fight for Ireland, the subsequent partition and the dispute over the 6 Ulster counties. They remained at loggerheads for years to come, particularly over neutrality, and de Valera's reluctance to let britain use the so-called Treaty Ports in the fight against Nazi-Germany during the Second World War. |
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Bóthar na Saoirse (The Road to Freedom) My Fight For Irish Freedom, Scéal Dan Breen,
TG4 2011. The colourful and complex South Tipperary guerrilla commander who started the War of Independence at Soloheadbeg in 1919 on the day the First Dail sat in Dublin. Forced to flee Tipperary he joined Michael Collins’ hit squad in Dublin but then opposed the 1921 Treaty negotiated by Collins. Later he joined De Valera’s Fianna Fail and was the first anti-Treaty activist to enter Dail Eireann and take the oath of allegiance he had fought to abolish. |
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The Irish Sugar Slaves of Barbados
TG4, 2011. Irish/English Language documentary with English subtitles. The Red Legs of Barbados are an ethnic group made up of the descendants of 50,000 Irish men and women who were sold into the slave trade between 1652 and 1659, and which have been largely ignored, apart from Seán O’Callaghan’s To Hell or Barbados: The Ethnic Cleansing of Ireland, publised in the 1980s. These Red Legs are descendants of innocent Irish people who were rounded up from across the country by teams of Oliver Cromwell’s “man-catchers”, bound in chains and shipped to Barbados to work on sugar plantations. |
Mitchell & Kenyon in Ireland 1902. Narrated by Fiona Shaw. (1hr 15min)
Click to view Thanks to Irish History Documentaries Mitchell & Kenyon in Cork 1902.
Click to view Mitchell & Kenyon Cork Collection
click image to view |
The Mitchell & Kenyon film company was a pioneer of early commercial motion pictures based in Blackburn in Lancashire, England at the start of the 20th century. They were originally best known for minor contributions to early fictional narrative film and Boer War dramatisation films, but the discovery in 1994 of a hoard of film negatives led to restoration of the Mitchell & Kenyon Collection, the largest surviving collection of early non-fiction actuality films in the world. This collection provides a fresh view of Edwardian era Britain and Ireland. More details here.
Below is the full edition of the Mitchell & Kenyon history produced by the BBC, 2004. |
The TV series "Radharc" will certainly be familiar to anybody over 50 in Ireland. This was an Irish television documentary series broadcast by RTÉ Television during the 1960's & 1970's.
The documentaries were created by a film unit founded by the conservative Catholic Archbishop of Dublin, John Charles McQuaid, in 1959. The film unit was staffed exclusively by Catholic priests, including the founders Joe Dunn and Desmond Forristal, as well as Peter Lemass. Putting the obvious religious ethos to one side, these films are invaluable today as a record of long gone aspects of Irish cultural, social and international perespectives of the 60s and 70's. Radharc produced over 400 programmes and the series was filmed in over 75 countries. A selection of Radharc films are below include a short documentary on the series 'A Taste of Radharc' from 2012. |
The story of Radharc RTE 2012
Inisheer 1971
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St Patricks Institution 1963
The Irish Holiday 1962
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Derry 1964
The Memory of the Dead 1968
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Click on the 'Archive' logo to view Radharc & other film collections maintained by the Irish Film Institute.
The IFI Irish Film Archive (part of the Irish Film Institute) collects, preserves and shares Ireland’s national moving image collection, a diverse resource that chronicles over one hundred years of Irish achievement and experience. The Archive collection spans 1897 to the present day, and the cameras of filmmakers have captured the development of modern Ireland in a uniquely accessible manner. The most important social, political and historical events of the last century are represented, enabling us to explore our cultural identity and connect with the past. |
The Edwardians in Colour. BBC 2008
In 1909, the banker, pacifist and idealist, Albert Kahn, was one of the richest people in Europe. At that time, he decided to create a photo archive of and for the people around the globe. He hired a whole crew of young people, whom he equipped with Autochrome cameras, before sending them to certain countries where he had them take pictures of regular people and the world as it was. The Autochrome was the first commercially available camera system that enabled the photographers to take true colour pictures. Today, the Albert Kahn photo collection consists of about 72,000 colour photographs as well as numerous hours of motion picture material in black and white as well as in colour, and is today considered to be the most important collection of early colour photographs in the world. Among these treasures are not only the first colour pictures ever from countries like the United States, Vietnam, Ireland and Brazil, but also a broad range of subject material from fishing boats, to architecture, to the Chinese during the reign of the Emperor and Ireland in pre war years. Luckily, this archive has survived practically in its entirety and is now located at the Musée Albert-Kahn in Boulogne-Billancourt, Paris
In 1909, the banker, pacifist and idealist, Albert Kahn, was one of the richest people in Europe. At that time, he decided to create a photo archive of and for the people around the globe. He hired a whole crew of young people, whom he equipped with Autochrome cameras, before sending them to certain countries where he had them take pictures of regular people and the world as it was. The Autochrome was the first commercially available camera system that enabled the photographers to take true colour pictures. Today, the Albert Kahn photo collection consists of about 72,000 colour photographs as well as numerous hours of motion picture material in black and white as well as in colour, and is today considered to be the most important collection of early colour photographs in the world. Among these treasures are not only the first colour pictures ever from countries like the United States, Vietnam, Ireland and Brazil, but also a broad range of subject material from fishing boats, to architecture, to the Chinese during the reign of the Emperor and Ireland in pre war years. Luckily, this archive has survived practically in its entirety and is now located at the Musée Albert-Kahn in Boulogne-Billancourt, Paris
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Reeling in the Years - 1962-2009
Reeling in the Years is an Irish television series shown on RTÉ 1.
Each episode, running for about 25 minutes and reviews the events of a particular year, from 1962 to 2009. News archive footage features, along with subtitles as the means of narration, recounts important national and international events of the time. Music from the selected year plays across the footage, with occasional scenes of live performances or music videos, often (but by no means exclusively) by an Irish artist. No advertisements are shown during the broadcast (apart from the occasional old advertisement dating from the relevant year)
Click the logo above to view.
Each episode, running for about 25 minutes and reviews the events of a particular year, from 1962 to 2009. News archive footage features, along with subtitles as the means of narration, recounts important national and international events of the time. Music from the selected year plays across the footage, with occasional scenes of live performances or music videos, often (but by no means exclusively) by an Irish artist. No advertisements are shown during the broadcast (apart from the occasional old advertisement dating from the relevant year)
Click the logo above to view.
Wogan's Ireland
BBC 2011. Veteran broadcaster Terry Wogan returns to his homeland in this two-part autobiographical series made for the BBC. Retracing his life from his birth in Limerick to his teenage years in Dublin and his eventual emigration to England in his late twenties, Wogan steps back into his past to explore how his country shaped him, and ask what it means to be Irish in the 21st century. Over the course of five decades he was responsible for radio and television hit shows that attracted tens of millions of viewers and listeners, making him the most successful Irish broadcaster ever. His immediately recognisable accent was familiar in every household in the UK and Ireland, and his surreal and often subversive sense of humour, delivered apparently off the cuff, made him a uniquely appealing star. |
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On television he presented some of the biggest game shows and chat shows of the 1970s and 1980s, but he is probably most famous now for his annual commentary on the Eurovision Song Contest, where he caused outrage among some competing countries for his irreverent and hilarious summing up of the outlandish and often dreadful acts on view. He always made sure he had a bottle of wine with him on Eurovision night, but advised his successor, Graham Norton, not to start drinking “until song nine”. Always happier without a script, he was no fan of intensive planning or pre-production meetings. He was gifted instead with the remarkable and highly unusual ability to speak fluidly live on air with self-deprecating wit and erudition on whatever subject happened to come up.
Born in Limerick, Michael Terence Wogan began his broadcasting career with RTÉ in the early 1960s but quickly started working in the UK. He was very clear throughout his life that he had come to consider England as his home. He was also conscious, though, of the tensions felt by his fellow Irish immigrants during the Provisional IRA bombing campaign, “Some people told me I made a difference by being a familiar Irish voice,” he told one interviewer. “That would be very important to me if I did that. I never did it consciously but I never saw any reason not to be Irish.”
Terry passed away 31 January 2016. “Ni bheidh a leithead ann aris” (we shall never see his like again)
Born in Limerick, Michael Terence Wogan began his broadcasting career with RTÉ in the early 1960s but quickly started working in the UK. He was very clear throughout his life that he had come to consider England as his home. He was also conscious, though, of the tensions felt by his fellow Irish immigrants during the Provisional IRA bombing campaign, “Some people told me I made a difference by being a familiar Irish voice,” he told one interviewer. “That would be very important to me if I did that. I never did it consciously but I never saw any reason not to be Irish.”
Terry passed away 31 January 2016. “Ni bheidh a leithead ann aris” (we shall never see his like again)
1916 - The Irish Rebellion
Narrated by Liam Neeson. RTE/BBC 2016 This three part landmark documentary series examines the 1916 Easter Rising in Dublin and the subsequent events that led to the establishment of an independent Irish State and indirectly to the breakup of the British Empire. Narrated by Liam Neeson, the series places the Irish Rising in its European and global contexts as anti-colonialism found its voice in the wake of the First World War. The documentary explores the crucial role of the United States and of Irish America in both the lead up to and the aftermath of the events. |
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1916 Seachtar Dearmadta (TG4 2015)
1916 The Forgotten Seven Irish Language TV Station TG4 produced these docudrama programmes examining the lives of the seven signatories to the Proclamation of the Irish Republic 1916. Their life stories are well known but what of the lives of the seven other men executed following the Easter Rising? Edward Daly, Michael O'Hanrahan, Willie Pearse, John MacBride, Michael Mallin, Sean Heuston and Con Colbert are also explored in this 2013 production. Filmed mostly using the Irish language but with English subtitles. |
"Following the Easter Rising, Dublin lay in ruins, and the rebels' hopes had been dashed. "The newly-declared Irish republic had been crushed by the might of the British Empire after only six days...However within five and a half years, the Irish had succeeded in wresting control of most of their country from one of the most powerful empires in the world. "Ironically, the British brought together the cream of a generation of revolutionary nationalists and allowed them, while in the camp, to map out the tactics of the future."
Director Rosie Ni Cionnaith. |
Frongoch - "University of Revolution" (TG4 2016)
Frongoch, the former Welsh whiskey distillery turned POW camp in 1914 became an internment camp where the British incarcerated 1,800 Irish rebels following the Rising. Among them was Michael Collins and 30 future Dail TDs. Frongoch was dubbed the "University of Revolution" as the seeds were sown between June and December 1916 for the later War of Independence and the new Irish state. The documentary used the diaries and letters of prisoners to tell the story in their own words. Frongoch — University Of Revolution focuses on three men: Collins, his spy Seamus O Maoileoin, and Joe Stanley, who printed bulletins during the Easter Rising. First broadcast in 2016 on TG4 and two Welsh channels, Collins, who first came to prominence as a camp leader in Frongoch, is played by actor Nick Lee. O Maoileoin, played by Stephen Darcy, was a teacher of Irish and would later become a successful spy. Stanley, from Dublin, known as the "Printer to the Easter Rising", was responsible for printing the war bulletins during Easter week. He kept detailed accounts of his time in Frongoch, even noting Collins' 100 yards race time in a Frongoch sports event. Stanley is played by his own great-grandson, Trevor Stanley. |
Easter Rising Stories
Presented by Marcus Howard an author and independent documentary film maker from Co.Louth. A descendant of Arthur Greene (a member of the IRB Dundalk & Sergeant-Major of the Irish Volunteers). Since 2016, Marcus has produced over one hundred and fifty historical documentary films. These include recollections of various 1916 participants as described by their descendants and relatives, as well as documentaries on events and leaders of the revolutionary period. It's a fascinating and incredible resource of information that will prove to be invaluable to current and future historians and generations who wish to know more of the period. |
These children were from every class and corner of Dublin life, and they were much more than just collateral damage. A century on, the sense of tragedy, loss & outrage is undimmed, as Joe Duffy retraces, respects and remembers these childrens’ lives and deaths
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Children of the Revolution. RTE 2016
Based on his best selling book, broadcaster Joe Duffy tells the story of the Irish 1916 Easter Rising as seen from the perspective of the 40 children who lost their lives during the conflict. One hundred years ago, a rebellion in a corner of the British Empire helped forge a new nation and altered the lives of millions… but it also ended the lives of 40 children. In every conflict, there are always casualties of war. Children of the Revolution uncovers the stories, lives and deaths of forty Dublin innocents, all aged 16 or under, to tell a timeless human story of life and death in the middle of conflict. Until now, many of them have gone unnamed, their final resting places unmarked, their sacrifice unrecognised. |
"The Enemy Files is a challenging and controversial documentary that shines a light on the difference between truth and fiction, offering an alarming glimpse at the many distortions that shape our history."
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The Enemy Files. RTE/BBC 2016
Presented by former British Defence Secretary Michael Portillo, "The Enemy Files" is a film that offers a key perspective in a genuine understanding of the seismic events in Dublin in 1916. The documentary tells the story of the Easter Rising as told in the testimonies of those who suppressed it – British spies, soldiers, politicians and bureaucrats. This is the view from the British side and goes to the heart of the intelligence that the British State had access to prior to the 1916 rebellion along with the ever-increasing role that the rebels sought from Germany – “our gallant allies”. Portillo, explores the Rising and goes well beyond it, to the darker side of warfare. Hidden motives, withheld data and questionable interpretations of the facts are everywhere. |
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Ireland's Greatest - James Connolly with Joe Duffy
RTE 2010 Ireland's Greatest was a 2010 public poll by Raidió Teilifís Éireann (RTÉ) and associated television documentary series broadcast on RTÉ One, where viewers voted to choose the greatest person in the history of Ireland. The concept was based on the BBC series 100 Greatest Britons. Each of the top five was profiled in a one-hour documentary programme broadcast in autumn 2010 and presented by a public figure advocating that person's claim to the title of "greatest person". In contention were John Hume, James Connolly, Mary Robinson, Michael Collins and Bono. |
Irish Film Institute "The After 16 Collection"
Funded by Bord Scannán na hÉireann/the Irish Film Board, After ’16 is a creative response by Irish filmmakers to the events of Easter 1916. This collection of nine short films is a mixture of live-action, animation and documentary, telling stories from the eve of the Rising all the way to the Troubles in 1970s Northern Ireland and beyond - four of the best are below. |
The true story of young Vinny Byrne, a fourteen-year-old boy who found himself fighting for Ireland in the Easter Rising. An eighty-year-old Vinny reminisces on his time with the volunteers, which took him around the city during the fighting. With Vinny’s Dublin brought to life by handmade miniature sets and puppetry, the film offers a uniquely charming first-hand account of the 1916 Rising. Vinny was later one of Collins' 'Twelve Apostles' (8m35s)
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As rebels planned Ireland’s 1916 Easter Rising, they were watched by two spies within their groups code-named Granite and Chalk. This documentary delves into British intelligence to tell their story, one century on. (12 m)
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On the eve of his execution on May 7th 1916, Michael Mallin’s two-year-old son Joseph was brought to see him in Kilmainham Gaol. That night, his father wrote a letter that would change Joseph’s life forever. In it he tells family he loves them and asks his little boy to be a priest. (11m32s)
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Ireland, Easter, 1916. In Dublin, Irish rebel Patrick Pearse leads a revolt to free Ireland from the grips of the British Empire. Owen, a young Irish patriot, wants to join them in their fight for freedom. (13m56s)
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Trial of the Century. TV3 (2016)
TV3’s 1916 centenary programme ‘Trial of the Century’ is an imagined, alternative history, imagining what might have happened if the leaders of the Rising had been brought to a civil trial instead of courts martial and execution. The three-part drama special stars Tom Vaughan-Lawlor as the rebel leader. Other names cast in the production include Mark Huberman as George Gavan Duffy, Andrew Bennett as lead prosecutor Sebastian Banks, Aoibhinn McGinnity as mum Catherine Foster, Denis Conway as Pearse’s senior counsel and Anthony Brophy as Eoin MacNeill. Thanks to Pat Maher. |
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The Wind That Shakes the Barley is a 2006 war drama film directed by Ken Loach, set during the Irish War of Independence (1919–1921) and the Irish Civil War (1922–1923). Written by long-time Loach collaborator Paul Laverty, this drama tells the fictional story of two County Cork brothers, Damien O'Donovan (Cillian Murphy) and Teddy O'Donovan (Pádraic Delaney), who join the Irish Republican Army to fight for Irish independence from the United Kingdom. The film takes its title from Robert Dwyer Joyce's "The Wind That Shakes the Barley", a song set during the 1798 rebellion in Ireland and featured early in the film. The film is heavily influenced by Walter Macken's 1964 novel The Scorching Wind.
Widely praised, the film won the Palme d'Or at the 2006 Cannes Film Festival. Loach's biggest box office success to date, the film did well around the world and set a record in Ireland as the highest-grossing Irish-made independent film. |
Shake Hands with the Devil is a 1959 film produced and directed by Michael Anderson that Time Magazine voted in 2012 as one of the "Fifteen best political Films of all time".
Filmed in Dublin, and at Ardmore Studios in Bray, Ireland during 1958, it was based on the 1933 novel of the same name by Rearden Conner, the son of a Royal Irish Constabulary policeman. Set in 1921 Dublin as the Irish Republican Army battles the British Army and the Black and Tans, it starred James Cagney and Don Murray. Also featured are Dana Wynter, Glynis Johns, Sybil Thorndike and Michael Redgrave. Some famous Irish actors also co-starred - Ray McAnally, Cyril Cusack and Noel Purcell but it was Cagney as a medical doctor and university professor moonlighting as an undercover IRA commandant that steals the show. Time Magazine commented that the film ".. is far more than an above-average historical drama. What sets Shake Hands With the Devil apart as a political film is its clear-eyed depiction of a man in the grips of a political passion so incendiary that he’s no longer a freedom fighter, but a rote agent of destruction." See Time's list here |