A beautifully filmed, heartfelt adaptation of Niall Williams' best-selling novel.  Two young people are made for each other, but as fate and  power of true love pull them together, so too does life threaten to tear them apart.

Nicholas (Fionn O'Shea) and Isabel (Ann Skelly) are made for each other, but fate does not always choose the easiest path to true love. Nicholas' father, William (Pierce Brosnan), comes home one day to shatter his family's modest life, when he tells them that in a moment of divine intervention, God has instructed him to dedicate his life to painting. He quits his job and sets off for the coast, leaving his shell-shocked wife and son to fend for themselves. Meanwhile Isabel and her family live a charmed existence on a small neighbouring island, their house full of music and poetry. When tragedy strikes, the music stops, and Isabel's parents (Helena Bonham Carter, Gabriel Byrne) decide in their grief to send Isabel to a convent school on the mainland. The young lovers embark on their own individual journeys of heartache and misplaced love, before fate contrives to pull the threads of their lives together. Filmed in Donegal and Antrim by cinematographer Damien Elliott, certainly makes the locations glimmer. The skies and seas are azure blue, the beaches are golden, and the sun never seems to dim, lending the film a beautiful fairytale quality.

UK/Ireland 2024 Polly Steele 125m

A mother and her daughter embark on a journey to the Spanish coast to find a cure for the mother’s illness, and along the way the daughter discovers another reality far from her controlling mother.

Rose (Fiona Shaw) and her daughter Sofia (Emma Mackey) travel to the Spanish seaside town of Almería to consult with the shamanic Dr. Gómez, a physician who could possibly hold the cure to Rose's mystery illness, which has left her bound to a wheelchair. But in the sultry atmosphere of this sun-bleached town, Sofia, who has been trapped by her mother’s illness all her life, finally starts to shed her inhibitions, enticed by the persuasive charms of enigmatic traveller Ingrid (Vicky Krieps). Sofia's increased freedom becomes too much for her controlling mother and as the hot sun beats down, their relationship simmers with pent-up resentments and bitterness, threatening to tear the fragile threads that hold them together and leading them to a dramatic conclusion. Emma Mackey’s persuasive journey as Sofia is a standout and the elusive style of storytelling adds to the intrigue of the film.

UK/Greece 2025 Rebecca Lenkiewicz 92m

In Liebe, Eure Hilde

A young woman falls in love with a member of an anti-Nazi group. The two spend the summer together until they get caught by the Gestapo and she is imprisoned, eight months pregnant.

Berlin, 1942: it was the most beautiful summer for Hilde Coppi (Liv Lise Fries) – madly in love with Hans (Johannes Hegeman) and joyfully pregnant. But amid the passion there is grave danger. Hans becomes involved in the anti-Nazi resistance, with a group of young people who will later be called the “Red Orchestra”. Despite the huge risks, Hilde decides to get involved herself but is arrested by the Gestapo and gives birth to her son in prison. Now in a desperate situation, Hilde develops a quiet inspirational strength, but she only has a few months left with her son. The main protagonist is mostly soft-spoken, reticent and reserved throughout, which is very refreshing, nothing like the warrior queens and Amazonian figures popular cinema loves to laud as female role models. You may remember Andreas Dresden as the director of our 2022 Chichester Film Festival Surprise film – ‘Rabiye Kurnaz vs. George W. Bush’.

Germany 2024 Andreas Dresen 125m