The Irish Film Festival Australia has been sharing the culture, traditions, history and character of Ireland and the Irish people with Australians since 2015. The festival is a not-for-profit cultural event supported by the Irish Embassy in Canberra and the Irish Consulate in Sydney.
From gripping dramas and powerful documentaries to fresh new voices shaping Irish cinema, the Irish Film Festival Australia (IFF26) returns from October 8th until November 15th 2026 with its biggest program in 12 years. IFF26 will showcase a record 18 films and documentaries, including 13 Australian premieres, alongside a vibrant program of Irish and Irish/Australian short films.
Screening across five Australian cities and online nationwide, this year’s festival offers audiences an unmissable window into contemporary Ireland, celebrating the stories, people and places that continue to shape the country’s distinctive and beloved cinematic voice. 2026 program highlights include the Australian Premiere of Chasing Millions, Galway Film Fleadh award winners Trad, Horseshoe and Girls & Boys, and IFTA nominees Báite (The Drowned), Fréwaka (Roots) and Testimony.
Festival director Dr Enda Murray BSc MA DCA is an award-winning filmmaker and educator with 30 years’ experience in the industry having worked in Ireland, USA, England and Australia. Enda Murray’s work has featured in numerous international film festivals and on BBC, RTE, ITV, ABC, NITV, Maori TV and SBS.
As the festival prepares to launch on October 8th, Nick L’Barrow spoke with festival director Enda Murray about how the festival has grown over the last 12 years, and the connections between Australian and Irish filmmaking history.
Nick: For me, one of the great things about film festivals is that it gives audiences a chance to see films, in the cinema, that they might not have had the chance to otherwise. I’m curious to know what your relationship has been with film festivals over time, both as a film lover and as a festival director?
Enda Murray: My first encounter with film itself was probably the late 70s in Dublin, where I first saw an independent film. I was awestruck because I’d never seen anybody like me on the screen before. And similar to Australia, Ireland kind of had a 70s new wave, and that is when I got interested in film. I was also very interested in music, so I did a lot of music and club promotion in Ireland, but I was also making films. My first credit was in England about 33 years ago. I was making predominantly independent, political activist films and television, or films based around community stories about communities who I didn’t think were getting a fair wrap. Then 12 years ago, I started the Irish Film Festival – just me and my credit card! Which didn’t go very far [laughs]. But it’s still going and it’s a lot of fun! I suppose my passion is about getting contemporary stories from Ireland. I am a hibernophile, which is someone who loves Ireland.
Nick: With a focus on contemporary Irish stories, do you feel like there is a theme within the films that have been selected for this year’s festival?
EM: I suppose the festival would be a love letter from Ireland, and there is a lot of variety in there. There is a transgender love story set in Dublin, but it has a particular flavour of Irish social history. There are films set around 25 years ago during a time where we were dominated by the Catholic Church. There is a classic film from 1990 with Shanae O’Near set in Derry. A documentary called Testimony which looks at women who were sent to mother and baby homes which was still apparent in Ireland well into the 90s, where babies were taken away and sometimes adopted illegally. And there are obviously parallels there with Australia’s colonial history. Obviously, it’s not the same, but there are parallels, even with things like how indigenous languages were lost through colonialism. But these are the stories which are coming out of Ireland at the moment, and that’s what I am interested in bringing to Australia.
Nick: One film that has been programmed that caught my eye was Chasing Millions, which has a more direct connection between Ireland and Australia…
EM: That film was something that was on our radar for a little while in terms of being a co-production between Ireland and Australia. It was something we were definitely aware of. There has been a treaty between the two countries since, I think, 1978 where films can be co-productions, but very few films have actually been made under that treaty. I’m keen to encourage support for filmmaking between Ireland and Australia because I don’t think there are enough. So that was one thing. But, I was also interested in the subject matter. It’s based around a bank robbery that took place in 2004, during a time that was leftover from the Troubles in Northern Island. So it explores intergenerational trauma – to quote Kneecap. It’s a story about how people move on from conflict. What does it look like to have two communities coming together? But, Chasing Millions is also a comedy, and audiences love comedy. We have a lot of angst-written films coming out of Ireland, but our comedies are also really good, and I think Chasing Millions hits the mark. The film has an Australian as the leading lady – Madeleine Madden, who herself is indigenous, so there is that connection again between Irish and Australian indigenous culture. This is a very fitting film for the festival, and it’s also exciting because it’s the Australian premiere!
Nick: Earlier you mentioned having a background with music, as well as film. My perception has always been that Ireland has such a strong historical connection with music as a way to emotionally tell the stories of the country. How has filmmaking also become a part of that way to tell impactful stories?
EM: Yeah, that’s a good question. For a long time, Ireland was a location for film. You had movies like The Quiet Man with John Wayne, where Ireland was this place where Americans would dream of travelling overseas too. It’s almost like it didn’t exist. And that was the case too in the terms of the reality of filmmaking for many, many years. Ireland was this place where you shot fantasy films. But when we had that new wave of independent films in the 70s, almost like Aussie films like Wake in Fright and whatnot which showed the reality of Australia. They weren’t advertisements for tourism. I think Ireland has had this natural move to telling stories on film. We have Screen Ireland who recognised early on that this could be a money spinner. That it was a good bet economically. We’ve also been so lucky that Ireland is between Europe and America, so we’ve had a lot of Irish people have commercial success overseas, like Cillian Murphy and Saoirse Ronan. The Irish film industry is in pretty good shape at the moment. There’s a lot of directors, actors, and productions coming in from America because we have the skill base here to produce at the top level in terms of production values. I think that the Irish have taken to the idea of being story tellers, and that is building on a long history of storytelling.
Nick: I think it’s also incredible to see the festival build off of that too. This year you have 18 films in the festival – which is a record. What does the growth of the festival tell you about the Australian audiences desire to see more of those stories coming out of Ireland?
EM: I think people are interested in diverse stories coming from different places. I went to the Sydney Film Festival, and I saw films from Norway, Canada, Ghana, in the space of two days. People are interested in those different cultures. Seeing something that is different from their everyday life. The strength of Irish culture in the terms of music, language, and storytelling is something that is of interest. In the last census, it showed that 11% of Australians have Irish grandparents, or around 30% have Irish heritage. People want to discover more about their heritage and ancestry. They want to connect with the stories that make up who they are as a person. In a digital age where we are swamped with AI, the idea of ancestry and lineage and people, I think movies are a great way to connect with that in a strong way.
Thank you to Enda for his time. The 2026 Irish Film Festival is playing around Australia between October 8 – November 9. Head to www.irishfilmfestival.com.au for more information and tickets.
