(Streaming Platform established by Simon Maguire)

Cillian Murphy’s Oscar-winning performance in Oppenheimer last year may have provided the Irish film industry with its latest publicity boost on the international stage, however a project established closer to home will very likely offer a useful platform for another reason to mark that success.

The streaming service Eiretainment was set up by radio producer Simon Maguire as a response to the fact that Irish cinema – in the widest sense of the term – lacked a platform to support a diversity of its most interesting and overlooked work. The new virtual space provides a refreshing approach to accessing somewhat sidelined elements of Irish cinema that are otherwise lost in the cut-and-thrust of the mainstream generic, box-office determined industry of its international neighbours. A mechanism in the same vein as AMC Theatres and the Criterion Channel, the unique selling point of Eiretainment is its innovative incarnation as an “Irish Netflix”, taking the best of that platform’s functionality and adopting it to indigenous purposes. Eiretainment provides a home for creative work from the Irish independent film industry which other larger industry regulars often reject for fear of unprofitability or high risk (Irish Examiner). Once more solidly established, however, Eiretainment could also be seen as a tool to which local filmmakers might have recourse for publicity not merely as an a posteriori consideration, but as a target outlet for distribution and promotion of the country’s best cinematic culture. It could ideally counter the reductive interpretation of the Irish industry as merely a production line only for an endless stream of successful actors on the international stage and prevent the country from becoming an “Actor’s studio” without a local showcase network to support it.

In an interview conducted with the company’s founder, Simon Maguire, the entrepreneur stated that his creation came out of a sense of dejection towards an Irish film industry that had no real outlet to present its lesser-known talents or more obscure (even marginalised) work. Maguire initially conceived of the project in the years before the COVID lockdown and was careful about advancing the plan too hastily. As a part of his primary research he discussed it with industry insiders who felt with some optimism that “there was a space for it”. Maguire was adamant in declaring that Volta (the only previously known Irish film streaming service which suspended its online activities in November 2024) was not an influencing template because it also featured films from other countries without necessarily – even uniquely – foregrounding Ireland. It required its customers to purchase individual films, something he felt was not necessarily the best model to support Irish filmmakers. Maguire believed that Irish audiences seemed to be lacking confidence in the country’s filmic talents (at least as far as being drawn to their films was concerned) and that an Irish-centred streaming service could change grassroots perceptions. With an aggressive and clear agenda, it could survive and would ideally thrive. Lost esteem among many talented contributors to the sector did not tally with evidence that the industry was punching well above its weight internationally. Observing other similar exhibition platforms globally, Maguire began wondering: “Why can’t we do that?” Eiretainment was immediately conceived by its creator as a “one stop shop” for Irish cinema, which in time would host online film festivals and gradually break into both European and American markets. It will soon have a “Freeview” feature where four to five films will be free to watch for any subscriber, with an additional streaming service charge of €6 to watch other films on the site.

With fifty films (both shorts and feature length) already available, representing a rich diversity of cultures throughout the country, Eiretainment features many of the nation’s biggest stars. The list includes Barry Keoghan, Domhnall Gleason and “The Walls” lead singer and actor Steve Wall, and many of our most distinguished artists performing in roles long before they achieved international acclaim). A host of continual additions is on the horizon, with new films coming in the next few weeks and months that (with a degree of publicity-stirring acumen) Maguire would not reveal. His current personal project, about a UFC fighter, was inspired by the Netflix/ESPN documentary The Last Dance, which narrated Michael Jordan’s last season with the Chicago Bulls basketball team. In fact, the same documentary was even an inspiration for the website as it encouraged Maguire to take a college film course with film lecturer, James Fitzgerald (later becoming a collaborator), who revealed invaluable details about Irish cinema history and the contemporary film industry in Ireland.

Irish language films will also become a part of the site in 2025 as Maguire is insistent on counteracting what he claims is underexposure of that category. Not shying away from more complex ideas of identity and national culture, he believes that the question “What is Irishness?” will be an essential part of the site’s existence. Inclusivity and the cultural benefit of integration are central: “If the films are good then they should be included to discuss and express Irish life in all its forms no matter what race, disability or creed is represented”. Maguire would also like to exhibit stories of Irish American life, perhaps somewhat controversially holding that they seem to have been left behind in the filmic space. In many respects the themes and stories of films on Eiretainment echo the philosophy and modus operandi of the platform: they also present characters and situations of marginalised status and experience.

Two films currently on the platform are exemplary of this. Both New Boy and Corduroy depict and navigate contemporary experiences of “new Irishness”. Directed by Steph Green, New Boy depicts the life of an immigrant child from Uganda; an aspect of Irish life as relevant to our contemporary state as it was when the film was produced fifteen years ago. In this short film written by Roddy Doyle, the classroom becomes an Unheimlich blur – of familiar and unfamiliar qualities – to Joseph, as the space is compared to one in his homeland, run by his father. His classmates reveal latent and unrecognised racism and treat him as an alien who must sit “next to Kamala”, the only other black girl in the class. Even she reacts angrily to this suggestion, registering a fear of alienation by the group because of the association with the unassimilated new pupil. Joseph in many ways acts as both a conduit for, and a projection of, a latent uncertainty among Irish audiences. Paradoxically, he is seen as both a character of the past and a present reminder of Ireland’s history as a nation and people. He represents the feelings of isolation and fear of not being accepted that many of his classmates’ older relatives experienced or held in their cultural memories. The film’s constant use of flashbacks signifies this temporal connection and forges a relationship between the past Irish experience and the contemporary Irish guest with a longing to return to a homeland that lives under the devastation of internal war. The shifting timeframes underscores a more complicated relationship between western countries (including Ireland) who either colonised or proselytised in continents with decades of military occupation and missionary projects. Despite suffering its own colonial regime the film has the potential to remind us of the “compelling influence that Ireland has exerted over Africa” (Ejorh 2007: 47). In Africa and possibly throughout the world, Ireland bears responsibility as a key player in the “Western civilising mission” of a continent that continues to suffer, and whose people now emigrate towards the west because of its meddling (Ejorh 2007). In many ways, Ireland’s unique place as a “colonised” cultural coloniser in the postcolonial world is seen in this interaction. Both Joseph and his Irish classmates are made to feel powerless and criminalised by the teacher’s orders, perhaps another reenactment of a scene of “the Irish colonial dilemma” (48).

In Corduroy, Ireland’s relationship with mental health (specifically, autism) is represented through the eyes of Tess, a young adult who has recently attempted suicide. Directed by Hugh O’Connor, the film portrays for the audience what the condition is like: viscerally depicting how sensorial experiences create a sense of isolation that is subjectively impossible for an average viewer to imagine. O’Connor meticulously unsettles his audience, dislocating and distorting its relationship not only with the film’s mise en scène but also with the cognitive sensations of its central character. As we are shown the world through Tess’ eyes directly by various alternating shots of point of view and objective perspective, we witness a world distinctly abject. This marginalisation and sense of alienation are manifest most clearly in a failure to comprehend and concentrate on the conversations Jesse has with her helper, Mahon. As an outlet, Jesse escapes to the sea where she is at peace and where the water’s surface – “the sea’s membrane” that surfers refer to as “corduroy” – gives her a degree of serenity. Having escaped terra firma, the character’s detachment from the figurative and literal land of the national island perhaps counterintuitively offers a sense of reconnection and peace. In keeping with O’Connor’s attempt to align the spectator and protagonist’s sensations, he creates underwater scenes that become tranquil and comforting for both the audience and the character. The ocean, so often depicted as a monster in Irish art or as the taker of lives in mythical narratives, is depicted as a force of healing and unification. Ireland’s geographical isolation acts as a poignant metaphor for autism as both are centred on a sense of separation from the rest of the land-connected continents and the experiences of most of the world’s populations. This metaphorical sense of being an island is introduced as she struggles in one scene to keep up with conversations over dinner. The film becomes a mindscape for Jesse. It is not one she can fully control so it parallels well with the cinematic flow of images allowing spectators to feel her plight. Autism activist Temple Gardin has stated that the “moving image” is the medium of choice for exploring ideas and experiences of the audiovisual isolation of autism (Clayton 2022: 215), and O’Connor’s film perfectly captures this realm.

Eiretainment can be seen as a new beacon for the Irish film industry: one that allows us not only to explore our talents as filmmakers on this island, but also to become an outlet for often forgotten members of Irish society. The new site can become a place for Irish film practitioners to interact with their own indigenous population, but also with a wider global spectatorship and broadcast a sense of Irishness that other industrial centres may be less inclined to explore. More affirmatively, it may act as a second branch to an Irish filmic culture that has recently emerged with incredible impact out of long-cast historical shadows.