Best Movies Set in Ireland

An epic romance set during the tumultuous period before the Irish War of Independence, “Ryan’s Daughter” follows a young married Irish woman who is bored with life in her small nationalist village and starts an affair with a British officer, despite the political environment that surrounds her.

Based on the best-selling memoir of the same name by Frank McCourt, this biographical drama follows a Brooklyn family of Irish immigrants who return to Ireland during the Great Depression, only to be met with more squalor, as the children begin to die and their dejected father spends his only earnings on alcohol.

Set in 1950s Ireland, “The Playboys” is about a beautiful and strong-willed young woman in a quaint Irish village who has a child out of wedlock, refuses to marry any of her suitors, and falls in love with a performer whose traveling dramatic troupe stirs up the town.

An action thriller starring Jackie Chan, “The Foreigner” follows a London-based Chinese restaurant owner and former soldier who takes the law into his own hands, traveling to Northern Ireland, when his teenage daughter is killed in a terrorist bombing claimed by an Irish republican organization.

Set in Dublin in the 1950s, “Circle of Friends” follows two young women from a small town in Ireland who are starting their first year at university. Love, mistakes, and heartache ensue as they reconnect with their beautiful childhood friend, Nan, and meet a handsome med student.

After 14 years in prison for IRA involvement, a young man tries to rebuild his life in Belfast, starting a nonsectarian boxing club that is open to both Catholics and Protestants. IRA operatives abound, however, and soon he finds himself the target of violence while also becoming entangled with his old flame, who is now married to an incarcerated man.

This fantastical film follows two young Irish Traveller brothers growing up in public housing on the outskirts of Dublin, as their grandfather regales them with magical folk tales, and they set out on their own mystical quest to find a stolen horse.

Based on the infamous 1981 hunger strike at Maze Prison in Northern Ireland, this historical drama recounts the prisoners’ demands for better treatment, and the choices their mothers had to make between following their sons’ wishes or having them force-fed to save their lives.

With an alcoholic father and a bipolar mother, young Francie Brady deals with his home life by retreating into the violent world of his own imagination, but when bad comes to worse, he eventually acts out his brutal fantasies.

This biographical drama details the work of Michael Collins, an Irish revolutionary and politician who served as the director of intelligence for the IRA during the Irish War of Independence and then commander-in-chief of the National Army during the Irish Civil War.

This action comedy concerns an unlucky ex-con who tries to do the right thing, only to end up deeper and deeper in a twisted mob scheme with a brutal partner and an incessantly talkative hostage.

An adaptation of a lengthy James Joyce short story, “The Dead” takes place in Dublin at the turn of the 20th century and focuses on a married couple as they attend a Christmas party and learn a thing or two about themselves and each other.

Father James is the head of a small parish, and a pious man who aims to serve his community. His life, however, begins to unravel when a man who was abused by a priest as a child threatens to kill him.

In an exploration of race, gender, and patriotism, “The Crying Game” follows a rogue IRA operative whose life veers wildly off track when he befriends a captive British soldier and promises to take care of the soldier’s girlfriend in London.

Set in Dublin just after the Irish War of Independence, “The Informer” tells the story of a destitute and disgraced Irish Republican who informs on his former comrade for a small reward in hopes of escaping to America with his girlfriend.

Amidst the social and political turmoil of 1970s Belfast, an idealistic music-lover opens a record store to bring Reggae and harmony to a bombed-out neighborhood, and ends up starting a punk rock revolution.

Like “Some Mother’s Son” (No. 22), this film, based on the 1981 hunger strike at Maze Prison, is about Bobby Sands, an incarcerated IRA member and the ringleader of the strike that aimed to help Republican inmates regain their status as political prisoners rather than criminals.

This fantasy adventure film features a wily troupe of leprechauns and their king, as well as an estate caretaker who is constantly trying to capture the Little People, his beautiful daughter, and a greedy townsman who attempts to take the caretaker job for himself and the daughter as his wife.

During the Troubles, a young British Army recruit is accidentally abandoned by his unit after a riot in Belfast, forcing him to hide out and make his way through hostile territory, unsure of the intentions of the people he encounters.

During the Irish War of Independence, two brothers who fight together for freedom from British rule end up in different factions, as one supports the Anglo-Irish Treaty and one demands nothing less than a free republic.

Based on a novel by Roddy Doyle, “The Commitments” is a musical comedy about an unemployed Dublin youth who idolizes 1960s soul musicians and sets out to create a soul band of his own, made up of his working-class friends.

Based on a heartrending true story, “Philomena” follows an out-of-work journalist who agrees to take on a story about an aging woman’s search for her son, whom she was forced to give up at an Irish convent nearly 50 years earlier.

This fantasy adventure film draws upon the folklore of the selkies, seals that can shed their skin and become human. It follows a young girl whose baby brother washed out to sea years earlier and is rumored to be living with the selkies.

“Bloody Sunday” is a dramatization of the Bloody Sunday massacre that took place in Derry, Northern Ireland, on Jan. 30, 1972, when British troops fired on unarmed civil rights protestors, killing 13 immediately and wounding another 15.

A romantic comedy-drama starring John Wayne and Maureen O’Hara, “The Quiet Man” follows a retired American boxer who returns to his birthplace in Ireland to buy his old family cottage and homestead, and ends up falling for the younger sister of the man who wants the land for himself.

A work of pioneering cinematography, “Barry Lyndon” follows the exploits and downfall of an Irish rogue and former soldier who marries a wealthy widow in an attempt to secure a comfortable position for himself.

This biographical comedy-drama is based on the autobiography of Christy Brown, an Irish writer and artist who was born with cerebral palsy, into a large working class family, and taught himself to write and paint using the only part of his body he had complete control over: his left foot.

Based on the autobiography of Gerry Conlon, a man whose troubles begin when he is mistaken for an IRA assassin, this biographical drama recounts the trials of the Guildford Four and Maguire Seven – innocent Irish civilians who were wrongfully convicted of involvement in the Guildford Pub bombings in England, some after false confessions given during torture by the police.