Country Poll: Ireland [RESULTS]

[Fergenaprido]

There were 135 films voted by 34 participants.

Below are all the films that received at least 25 points.

Rank	Title [AKA]	Year	Director	Points	Ballots	Best	IMDb	Votes	iCM	Checks	Toplists
1	In the Name of the Father	1993	Jim Sheridan	217	22	1		171,294		13,523	6
2	Song of the Sea	2014	Tomm Moore	146	17	1		57,327		4,549	5
3	The Wind that Shakes the Barley	2006	Ken Loach	131.5	12	1		49,884		4,555	2
4	Room	2015	Lenny Abrahamson	115.5	15	1		408,429		14,376	6
5	Sing Street	2016	John Carney	113	13	2		92,147		4,345	3
6	The Commitments	1991	Alan Parker	110	12	1		35,210		4,215	2
6	Calvary	2014	John Michael McDonagh	110	12	1		58,844		3,155	1
8	Once	2007	John Carney	108.5	14	1		115,646		16,004	3
9	My Left Foot: The Story of Christy Brown	1989	Jim Sheridan	105	13	3		73,334		8,111	6
10	The Lobster	2015	Yorgos Lanthimos	93	16	1		247,697		10,399	5
11	The Field	1990	Jim Sheridan	89	8	1		6,110		282	1
12	The Secret of Kells	2009	Tomm Moore	78	10	3		35,037		4,027	1
13	The Guard	2011	John Michael McDonagh	72	11	3		85,852		4,795	0
14	WolfWalkers	2020	Tomm Moore, Ross Stewart	63	8	2		30,313		1,020	1
15	The Killing of a Sacred Deer	2017	Yorgos Lanthimos	60.5	11	2		147,595		4,060	0
16	Dating Amber	2020	David Freyne	49	4	1		5,875		130	0
17	A Dark Song	2016	Liam Gavin	46	6	2		17,287		467	0
18	Return to Glennascaul	1953	Hilton Edwards	44	4	2		735		106	0
18	Intermission	2003	John Crowley	44	5	5		15,812		724	1
20	In America	2002	Jim Sheridan	42	5	3		42,935		3,424	1
21	Veronica Guerin	2003	Joel Schumacher	39	4	3		20,313		749	0
22	I Am Not a Serial Killer	2016	Billy O'Brien	35	5	3		14,609		515	0
23	Stitches	2012	Conor McMahon	32	3	2		9,584		379	0
24	Extra Ordinary	2019	Enda Loughman, Mike Ahern	31	3	3		9,981		299	0
24	Vivarium	2019	Lorcan Finnegan	31	4	6		54,668		960	0
26	Byzantium	2012	Neil Jordan	30.5	5	5		43,462		1,714	0
27	Michael Collins	1996	Neil Jordan	30	4	6		31,364		2,214	1
27	What Richard Did	2012	Lenny Abrahamson	30	2	4		5,095		292	0
29	The Butcher Boy	1997	Neil Jordan	29	4	5		10,935		1,275	4
30	The General	1998	John Boorman	27.5	4	6		8,708		691	1
31	Love & Friendship	2016	Whit Stillman	27	4	3		24,711		1,638	1
31	Citadel	2012	Ciarán Foy	27	4	1		7,039		324	0
33	Triage	2009	Danis Tanovic	26	2	2		10,307		302	0

Runners-up (20+ points or 3+ votes)

Rank	Title [AKA]	Year	Director	Points	Ballots	Highest Ranking	IMDb	Votes	iCM	Checks	Toplists
34	Omagh	2004	Pete Travis	24	2	4		1,660		90	0
35	The Boxer	1997	Jim Sheridan	23.5	3	1		20,656		924	0
36	The Breadwinner	2017	Nora Twomey	21	4	5		24,814		1,237	0
37	Bernadette: Notes on a Political Journey	2011	Lelia Doolan	20	1	1		22		2	0
37	Shake Hands with the Devil	1959	Michael Anderson	20	2	1		1,314		52	0
37	A Date for Mad Mary	2016	Darren Thornton	20	2	6		2,118		70	0
37	Inside I'm Dancing [Rory O'Shea Was Here]	2004	Damien O'Donnell	20	2	1		15,146		806	0
41	Ondine	2009	Neil Jordan	19.5	5	6		21,264		1,132	0
41	Breakfast on Pluto	2005	Neil Jordan	19.5	2	7		22,310		1,839	0
43	Isolation	2005	Billy O'Brien	19	4	7		7,291		274	0
53	Zardoz	1974	John Boorman	16.5	5	8		22,426		2,134	5
54	Jimmy's Hall	2014	Ken Loach	16	3	1		6,419		360	0
59	The Canal	2014	Ivan Kavanagh	14	3	6		14,117		439	0
67	Six Shooter	2004	Martin McDonagh	12	3	7		12,296		942	0

Films that received 1st place votes
5 - The Lobster - joachimt, Leopardi, Melvelet, TraverseTown, zomgmouse
4 - The Wind that Shakes the Barley - 3eyes, blocho, ororama, peeptoad
3 - In the Name of the Father - AB537, Gordon_Gekko, Panunzio
3 - Once - filmbantha, gunnar, outdoorcats
2 - Song of the Sea - Lakigigar, Mysterious Dude
2 - Room - Rufus-T, Teproc
2 - The Field - DudeLanez, Mario Gaborović
1 - Calvary - Silga
1 - The Commitments - Talking Elvish
1 - Dating Amber - Fergenaprido
1 - Citadel - sol
1 - The Boxer - beavis
1 - Bernadette: Notes on a Political Journey - RogerTheMovieManiac88
1 - Inside I'm Dancing - gromit82
1 - The Daisy Chain - zzzorf
1 - Jimmy's Hall - Caracortada
1 - BlinkyTM - mightysparks
3 - unranked - Angel Glez, cayado-coro, insomnius

Directors with multiple films in the Top 33
4 Jim Sheridan
3 Neil Jordan
3 Tomm Moore
2 John Carney
2 John Michael McDonagh
2 Lenny Abrahamson
2 Yorgos Lanthimos

Breakdown by Decade
1890s
1900s
1910s
1920s
1930s
1940s
1950s 1
1960s
1970s
1980s 1
1990s 6
2000s 7
2010s 16
2020s 2

[Fergenaprido]

Here are the results as an icm list: https://www.icheckmovies.com/lists/icm+ ... genaprido/
Here is the master list with the top 20 from each poll: https://www.icheckmovies.com/lists/icm+ ... genaprido/

Comparison with The Irish Times' Best 50 Irish Movies

Spoiler

Rank	Title [AKA]	Year	Country Poll Ranking	Notes
1	Barry Lyndon	1975	#N/A	British
2	The Dead	1987	#N/A	British
3	Anne Devlin	1984	#N/A
4	Man of Aran	1934	#N/A	British
5	Hunger	2008	#N/A	British
6	The Crying Game	1992	#N/A	British
7	The Quiet Man	1952	#N/A	American
8	Adam & Paul	2004	#N/A
9	The Wind that Shakes the Barley	2006	3
10	My Left Foot: The Story of Christy Brown	1989	9
11	The Lobster	2015	10
12	Brooklyn	2015	#N/A	British
13	Mise …ire	1959	#N/A
14	Song of Granite	2017	128
15	The Fading Light	2009	#N/A
16	Once	2007	8
17	The Magdalene Sisters	2002	#N/A	British
18	Silence	2012	#N/A
19	Good Vibrations	2012	#N/A	British
20	The Farthest	2017	#N/A
21	Rocky Road to Dublin	1968	#N/A
22	Odd Man Out	1947	#N/A	British
23	The Butcher Boy	1997	29
24	His & Hers	2009	#N/A
25	The Killing of a Sacred Deer	2017	15
26	The Image You Missed	2018	#N/A
27	Garage	2007	91
28	Bloody Sunday	2002	#N/A	British
29	December Bride	1991	91
30	The Secret of Kells	2009	12
31	Gaza	2019	#N/A
32	Chavez: Inside the Coup The Revolution Will Not Be Televised	2003	105
33	Waveriders	2008	#N/A
34	The General	1998	30
35	Flight of the Doves	1971	#N/A	British
36	The Commitments	1991	6
37	In America	2002	20
38	Silent Grace	2001	#N/A
39	Maudie	2016	#N/A	Canadian
40	Shadow Dancer	2012	#N/A	British
41	The Secret of Roan Inish	1994	#N/A	American
42	Hush-a-Bye Baby	1990	#N/A	British
43	Kings	2007	#N/A	British
44	Saviours	2007	#N/A
45	Good Favour	2017	#N/A
46	Kisses	2008	120
47	Snap	2010	#N/A
48	Intermission	2003	18
49	Cardboard Gangsters	2017	#N/A
50	Korea	1995	#N/A

Comparison with Irish Film & Television Academy Best Film Winners (icm list is missing the most recent winner)

Spoiler

Rank	Title [AKA]	Year	Country Poll Ranking	Notes
1	The General	1998	30
2	Angela's Ashes	1999	#N/A	American
3	Intermission	2003	18
4	Omagh	2004	34
5	Pavee Lackeen: The Traveller Girl	2005	#N/A
6	The Wind that Shakes the Barley	2006	3
7	Garage	2007	91
8	Hunger	2008	#N/A	British
9	The Eclipse	2009	128
10	As If I Am Not There	2010	#N/A
11	The Guard	2011	13
12	What Richard Did	2012	27
13	Calvary	2014	6
14	Song of the Sea	2014	2
15	Room	2015	4
16	A Date for Mad Mary	2016	37
17	Michael Inside	2017	#N/A
18	Black '47	2018	91
19	Ordinary Love	2019	#N/A	British
20	WolfWalkers	2020	14
21	An Cailín Ciúin The Quiet Girl	2021	#N/A

The Host's Hot Take
Our first smaller film country, I think we still managed to put together a decent-sized list, even if many will consider it predictable. Irish film didn't really take off until the 1980s, and it seems that forumgoers only really took notice of films form 1989 onwards, with the exception of one short and one runner-up from the 1950s. We didn't care much for the films chosen by the Irish Times, but there's a significant overlap with the Award winners list. Co-productions disqualified a number of contenders, as predicted, but overall I'm satisfied with the list. Even with many participants only submitting the minimum number of films (5), we still had almost the same number of films make the final list (33) as there were participants (34), which bodes well for future smaller countries as long as the participation keeps up. We lost about 20 voters from the previous major countries, though, so it will be interesting to see how good retention is in the future.

Hopefully, this got people to seek out more Irish films and appreciate what this smallish country has to offer. And for those who didn't feel they had seen enough to participate, may this list guide you in your journey.

Next up: Germany, and then New Zealand.

[gunnar]

Most of my selections ended up in the top 20 so that's good. I should have looked at the other ballots more carefully, though, since I see two other films which I would have included on my list had I realized that they were Irish - The Field and In America.

[gromit82]

Fergenaprido: Thanks for running the poll. I will definitely be voting in the Germany poll, albeit with a short ballot.

[peeptoad]

Thanks, Fergenaprido... I am really looking forward to the Germany poll (I've got at least two 10/10 films for that list)

[Melvelet]

Wow so we actually disqualified 6 out of the 7 best Irish movies according to an Irish newspaper for not being Irish enough

[OldAle1]

Wow so we actually disqualified 6 out of the 7 best Irish movies according to an Irish newspaper for not being Irish enough

One of the reasons I didn't participate in this one, though the main reason was that I've seen no more than 30 Irish films even by a liberal definition, and my few favorites are all the same ones that showed up near the top anyway - I wouldn't have been adding anything at all to this. Still, below the top 10 there are some films I haven't heard of that look potentially interesting, and that's really the main thing I get out of these lists in the first place.

[Fergenaprido]

Wow so we actually disqualified 6 out of the 7 best Irish movies according to an Irish newspaper for not being Irish enough

Yes, I did.

But, to be fair, they admit to having pretty flimsy rules as to what constitutes being Irish enough; the full intro is included in the icm list, including "Our rules are looser than some may prefer." Plus, it seems they included all of the island of Ireland in their list, not just the Republic of Ireland, so films from Northern Ireland feature there but not here.

From the top of their list, though, I guess I'm most surprised that Adam & Paul (2004) didn't get a single vote here: It's from the 1989-2022 time period that most films voted for were in, from a notable director (Lenny Abrahamson, whose films Room and What Richard Did made the main list, and Frank was close with 2 votes and 17 points), and it's an official check on the TSPDT 21st Century list. Haven't seen it myself, but I plan to see more of his films (just saw WRD right before the poll closed, and it just missed the end of my ballot).

[RogerTheMovieManiac88]

Thank you for the results, Ferg!

I've only seen 18/33, so several well-known ones still for me to catch up with!

I'm glad to see an early short film in the results in the shape of 'Return to Glennascaul'. That was one avenue where Irish film-makers focused their efforts in the 40s, 50s and 60s, before there was much of an indigenous feature film-making industry.

Slightly disappointing that there isn't a film from Bob Quinn on the list. His efforts from the 1970s on in founding CineGael in Connemara really make him the godfather of a non-State-run cinematic presence in Ireland. 'Poitín' is probably his most famous film, but I haven't seen it yet. People like Joe Comerford and Cathal Black are part of that First Wave of film-makers that came through at around the same time. Their works are hugely undervalued and underseen even here in Ireland, so it's not a huge surprise that they don't have a presence in these results.

Of the Carney musicals, I'm slightly surprised that 'Sing Street' places above 'Once'. I expected the latter to be in the top 5 here.

Fun to take part in this one, especially since it's my own country in focus.

[AB537]

Apparently I've seen more Irish films than I thought, 18/33 on the final list, including all of the top 10, as well as a bunch of co-productions that were ruled UK for the purposes of this exercise. Pretty happy with my ballot of 8 films, though in retrospect Sing Street probably should have been on my list too.

[Lakigigar]

Seen 5 out of 33 films, which is 15,15%. That's a higher percentage than the Australian list, and actually not much lower than UK/France which are in the 18-20% territory. But given the lower amount of films, that might also be misleading, also given that it might be easier for an Irish film to get into the Irish list than for a French one to get in the French list obviously.

And also i voted for all 5, but i don't think theey even needed my help. The eventual ranking might have mattered but to get in the top 33 i don't think they even needed my help, they would have made it anyways. The films i've seen & voted for are already more known (& acclaimed) ones in general.