Nothing Compares tours Northern Ireland, June 14th – June 18th (2023)
At Docs Ireland, we see our main goal as supporting all forms of Irish Documentary, and the exhibition of it in as many Irish places as possible, to as many people as possible.
This year Docs Ireland is starting a new project to help spread Irish feature documentaries to the growing Northern Irish community film sector. These community film clubs and cinemas are often in the harder-to-reach areas of the country, who have few cinema options. This year we are showcasing the biggest film of our festival in 2022, Nothing Compares.
Nothing Compares is the story of Sinéad O’Connor’s phenomenal rise to worldwide fame and how her iconoclastic personality resulted in her exile from the pop mainstream. Focusing on her prophetic words and deeds from 1987-1993, the film reflects on the legacy of this fearless trailblazer through a contemporary feminist lens.
Contact each venue for tickets – also available at filmhubni.org
- Flowerfield Arts Centre, Portstewart – Wednesday 14 June, 7pm
- Roe Valley Arts and Cultural Centre, Limavady, Thursday 15th June at 7pm
- Portrush Film Club – Thursday 15th June, 7pm
- Nerve Centre, Derry – 15th June at 7PM
- The Court House Bangor on Thursday 15th June, 7pm
- Subterranean Omagh – Friday 16th June, 7pm
- Dungannon Film Club – 16th June 7.30pm
- The Braid Studio Theatre, Ballymena – 2pm on Saturday 17th June
- Newcastle Community Cinema – Saturday the 17th of June at 8pm
High Rise low Rise (2020)
This archive-based project took place on Saturday 1st February in the impressive surroundings of the Masonic Lodge on Rosemary Street in Belfast. It was a playful, in-depth look at how modernist architecture and urban design was presented in media through the 1950s to the 1980s in Northern Ireland.
We presented archive documentaries and footage that covered 40 years of films that deal with the history and geography of housing, town planning and land use in Northern Ireland. These films touched on many of the issues that faced Northern Ireland through these tumultuous years, including politics, health, war and Sammy Wilson’s evolving mullet. These films have been rarely seen, and in many ways tell the wider story of Northern Ireland through the built environment.
Watch a preview clip on BBC Website.
The final (and most exciting) part was the performance! Belfast Film Festival commissioned musicians Blue Whale and Gross Net to provide live soundtracks to Utopian (High Rise) and Dystopian (Low Rise) archive films.
We obtained all our archive materials from the BBC and UTV archives, as well as from independent filmmakers Archie Reid and Terence McDonald.
This project was supported by the BFI Film Audience Network as part of Changing Times: Shifting Ground.
Man of Aran Commissioned Live Soundtrack (2019)
In June 2019, Docs Ireland and TG4 commissioned musicians Úna Monaghan, Ceri Owen and Síle Denvir to play a live soundtrack to classic Irish Documentary Man of Aran (1934).
The event took place at St. Joseph’s Church in Belfast.