Kurdish-Irish documentary Home: Zak Moradi’s Story and Nigerian feature The Kiss Of Death are among the world premieres at this year’s Galway Film Fleadh (July 9-14).
Home: Zak Moradi’s Story, directed by Ireland’s Trevor Whelan, follows the life of one man’s journey from childhood in a Kurdish refugee camp to Irish hurler and anti-racism activist.
The Kiss Of Death is a Nigerian film from Irish director Terry McMahon, whose credits include Patrick’s Day. It follows a man sent to northern Nigeria to teach, who discovers the cultural differences may cost him his life.
Scroll down for the line-up of world premieres
Another Irish-Nigerian collaboration to world premiere is Damian McCann’s Remnants, which is an Ireland, Nigeria and UK co-production. At a time in which museums and institutions in Ireland and abroad are actively decolonising their collections, the film explores the issue through stolen artefacts in museums across Ireland.
A further world premiere is Sam O’Mahony’s Northern Ireland-shot coming-of-age comedy dramaThe Wise Guy. Darrell D’Silva stars as a young boy who develops an unlikely friendship with an exiled mobster.
Irish-language films to world premiere include Luke Morgan’s comedy about brotherly love Froggie and John Farrelly’s The Ghost, that unfolds in a post-famine Ireland.
Irish documentaries in the line-up include the world premiere of Aoife Kelleher’s film Mrs Robinson, about Ireland’s first female president Mary Robinson.
Ciaran Cassidy’s Housewife Of The Year first played at CPH: Dox. The documentary tells the story of the surreal live-televised competition in which a generation of Irish women competed to be crowned ‘housewife of the year’, with former contestants share their direct experiences of marriage bars, the fight for contraception and Magdalene laundries.
The world cinema strand, with a prize fund of €3,000, includes the winner of the Sundance dramatic world cinema grand jury prize, Sujo and winner of the 2024 Berlinale Panorama audience award, Memories Of A Burning Body.
Peripheral Visions, the European cinema competition for first and second feature film makers, also returns, with a €5,000 prize.
With the final games of the European football championships to take place during the Fleadh, a special strand, The Beautiful Game, has been curated of football-themed films, including Icelandic doc The Home Game.
As previously announced, Sundance hit Kneecap will open the festival, with Palestine as the Fleadh’s country focus, screening films such as Inas Halabi’s We No Longer Prefer Mountains, Berlinale and Sheffield Doc Fest prize winner No Other Land, Farah Nabulsi’s Toronto title The Teacher and Mahdi Fleifel’s Cannes premiere To A Land Unknown, which is the closing night film.
Succession star Brian Cox is set to attend, and receive the Galway Hooker award for outstanding achievement.
Galway Film Fleadh 2024 world premieres
Laoch: Defy The Odds (Ire-Ger-UK)
Dir. Stephan Mazurek
The People Before (UK-Ire)
Dir. Steve Reeves
Are We One (Ire-US)
Dir. Dónal Ó Céilleachair
Froggie (Ire)
Dir. Luke Morgan
Amongst The Wolves (Ire)
Dir. Mark O’Connor
The Ghost (Ire-UK)
Dir. John Farrelly
Home: Zak Moradi’s Story (Kur-Ire)
Dir. Trevor Whelan
Dead Man’s Money (UK)
Dir. Paul Kennedy
The Kiss Of Death (Nig)
Dir. Terry McMahon
At Sea (Ire)
Dir. Sandy Kennedy
The Song Cycle (Ire)
Dir. Nick Kelly
Dreamtown (Ire)
Dir. Steven McKenna
Remnants (Ire-Nig-UK)
Dir. Damian McCann
Gleann (Ire)
Dir. Jesse Gilbert
Mrs Robinson (Ire)
Dir. Aoife Kelleher
Wishbone (Greece-Fr-Ger-Cyprus)
Dir. Penny Panayotopoulou
The Wise Guy (Ire)
Dir. Sam O’Mahony
Blue Fiddle (Ire)
Dir. Anne McCabe
Patchwork Family (Pol-Ire)
Dir. Sara Sulej
The Reserve (Ire)
Dir. MJ Whelan
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