Our 71st Festival kicks off tomorrow, offering you an opportunity to discover your next favourite film and hear from the creative talent behind it, from actors Éanna Hardwicke and Clare Dunne to filmmaker Dara Van Dusen and cinematographer Kate McCullough. We also have a very special family screening with actor Hilary Rose and a lively conversation between film critic Donald Clarke and filmmaker Paul Duane. Explore our opening weekend guest highlights below.
IN CONVERSATION: ÈANNA HARDWICKE
FRI 13 | ARC CINEMA | 13:00
A son of Cork and acclaimed star of screen and stage, Éanna Hardwicke’s recent work includes Ancestors (Fri 20 Nov, Everyman) and Saipan (which opened the 70th CIFF in 2025), TV’s The Sixth Commandment and Normal People, and The Playboy of the Western World at the National Theatre in London.
We are delighted to welcome Éanna back to the Festival to receive the Honorary Puttnam Award, named in honour of our patron David Puttnam, and to participate in this special ‘In Conversation’ about his career to date and future artistic ambitions.
Conversation hosted by journalist and podcaster Aoife Barry.
CLARE DUNNE:
THE EDUCATION OF JANE CUMMING & PAPER PLANE (IRISH SHORTS 1)
THE EDUCATION OF JANE CUMMING
FRI 13 | ARC CINEMA | 18:00 & SUN 22 | ARC CINEMA | 12:30
IRISH SHORTS 1: IN COMPETITION
FRI 13 | TRISKEL | 20:15 | WITH Q&A
We are thrilled to welcome IFTA-winning actor Clare Dunne who will join us to introduce the premiere of The Education of Jane Cumming on Friday 13 November (this is sold out, but there will be a repeat screening on Sunday 22).
She will also participate in a post-screening Q&A with Irish Shorts 1 programme in which Saoirse Ronan’s directorial debut, Paper Plane, features and Clare Dunne stars.
THE MYSTERY PACKAGE + HILARY ROSE
FAMILY & YOUNG PEOPLE
SAT 14 | ARC CINEMA | 14:30
With live narration in English by actor and CIFF Family Ambassador Hilary Rose.
For 22 years, a mysterious Christmas package has arrived at a Norwegian family’s home, always bearing gifts and the same enigmatic message. Now, young detectives Edle and Brage set out to uncover the identity of the mysterious sender, embarking on an adventure full of clues, surprises and unexpected discoveries.
This is a Relaxed Screening, meaning that it is appropriate for young people with sensory sensitivities and their families.
We are delighted to be partnering with The Good Shepherd for this screening and supporting the important work they do with families in our community. If you’d like to bring along a mystery package (it doesn’t matter the size!) to donate to families supported by The Good Shepherd, we’d be delighted. Read more here.
CINEMA OF FORESIGHT: A TALK
RETROSPECTIVE
SAT 14 | TRISKEL | 15:00 | FREE BUT TICKETED
Note: in a change to the printed programme, this event is FREE but ticketed.
What did films like Starship Troopers, Silent Running, Children of Men and Punishment Park see coming that the rest of us didn’t?
Join The Irish Times’ Donald Clarke and filmmaker Paul Duane for a lively conversation about the filmmakers whose extraordinary foresight anticipated so much of the world we live in today.
We’ll screen excerpts from remarkable films as our two passionate film lovers explore their ideas, predictions and uncanny visions of the future.
Part of our Cinema of Foresight Retrospective.
DARA VAN DUSEN & KATE McCULLOUGH
A PRAYER FOR THE DYING
SAT 14 | ARC CINEMA | 17:30 | WITH Q&A
FRI 20 | ARC CINEMA | 13:00
On Saturday 14 November, director Dara Van Dusen (above left) and cinematographer Kate McCullough (above right) will be in attendance and participate in a Q&A.
In 1870 Wisconsin, Civil War veteran and town sheriff Jacob Hansen is confronted by a deadly epidemic just as wildfires close in on his isolated community.
A haunting, feverish vision of the American frontier, A Prayer for the Dying transforms a small Wisconsin settlement into a pressure cooker of disease, fire and buried trauma. Johnny Flynn (Elsinore, Ripley) plays Jacob Hansen, a Civil War veteran serving as the town’s sheriff, pastor and undertaker, whose fragile grip on faith begins to fracture when diphtheria reaches the community. Opposite him, the great John C. Reilly brings a wonderfully restrained gravity to Doc, the pragmatic physician forced to confront the epidemic with science rather than prayer.
Dara Van Dusen’s striking debut unfolds less like a conventional Western than a slow-burning fever dream, and the devilishly beautiful images of award-winning Irish cinematographer Kate McCullough (The Quiet Girl) are instrumental to the film’s atmosphere and unique identity: a Western haunted by ghosts both personal and collective.
