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The Flats

A tower-block apartment in Belfast becomes a haunted inner landscape in a dark, cinematic film where the echoes of the conflict in Northern Ireland still reverberate in the corridors. An aging man on his final, existential mission confronts the ghosts of the past.

FLATPACK Festival, Sheffield

16 May 2025

Bookings closed

Light House Cinema, Dublin

Thurs 22 May 2025

Book here

Irish Film Institute, Dublin

Fri 23 May 2025

Book here

Queens Film Theatre, Belfast

Fri 30 May 2025

Book here

Movie House Cityside, Belfast

Mon 2 June 2025

Book here

“My aim was not to make a ‘political’ film, you know, but just to see the consequences of trauma… I thought, if we could get to the bottom of that, maybe it could represent the long-term consequences of many other wars as well.”

Alessandra Celesia (Irish News Interview)

An elderly man struggles to drag a coffin into a small flat in a run-down apartment block. A dark and mysterious scene that from the outset places ‘The Flats’ in a haunted interior landscape where past and present merge. And they certainly do in New Lodge in the center of Belfast, a neighborhood still haunted by the nearly 30-year conflict between Catholics and Protestants which officially ended in 1998. The man with the coffin is called Joe, and behind his unforgettable face, we still recognize the little boy who became involved in the bitter struggle for a united Ireland at far too early an age.

Today, he lives in ‘the flats’, and in his conversations with psychologist Rita, a rift in time and space opens up, revealing old ghosts. His 17-year-old uncle who was killed by a death squad. The street fights. The hunger strikes and the funeral of resistance icon Bobby Sands. Belfast’s painful modern history is tightly interwoven with the lives of Joe and the other New Lodge residents in Alessandra Celesia’s cinematic film, which deliberately unfolds in a timeless vacuum that resembles the 70s, yet is unmistakably contemporary. With reconstructions and a brilliant use of archival footage, Celesia conjures a subjective state where the past never really ended.

 

Produced by Films de Force Majeure  (France),  Thank You & Good Night Productions  (Belgium),  Planet Korda Pictures  (Republic of Ireland),  Dumbworld  (United Kingdom)

 

Supported by Eurimages, Région Sud, Tax Shelter of the Belgian Federal Government, Fís Éireann/Screen Ireland, National Centre for Cinema and the Moving Image, Centre for Cinema and Audiovisual of the Wallonia-Brussels Federation, BFI Doc Society Fund, RTBF – Unité Documentaire and Magellan Films, Tax rebate, Northern Ireland Screen, Bourse Brouillon d’un rêve de la Scam

 

For UK Distribution/Press Inquiries contact [email protected]

Press Review Quotes

“A powerful, timely and haunting film about a community living in the shadow of the pain and trauma of the Troubles in Northern Ireland.”Lise Pedersen – Variety

 

“A dark, uneasy reminder of the indelible, multi-generational stain of violence”Fionnuala Halligan – Screen Daily

 

“It’s a powerful, urgent and deeply sad film”Peter Bradshaw – The Guardian

 

Press Review Links

Screen Daily – The Party boards Belfast-set documentary ‘The Flats’ ahead of CPH: DOX premiere (exclusive)

The Guardian ★★★★ The Flats review – a powerful look at the unresolved agony of the Troubles

Irish News – Film on north Belfast New Lodge residents lands major prize at international film festival

RTE – Belfast documentary The Flats wins top prize in Copenhagen

Cineuropa – Review:  The Flats

The New Year That Never Came and The Flats crowned at Crossing Europe

Festivals & Awards

Crossing Europe Film Festival Linz 2025 – Best Documentary

Enville Festival de Cinéma 2025 – Jury Award

Thessaloniki Documentary Festival 2025

IFTA 2025 – Best Documentary Award

CPH:DOX 2024 – Best Film Award

Visions du Réel 2024 – Highlights section

Sheffield Doc Fest 2024

Sydney Film Festival 2024

Porto/Post/Doc: Film & Media Festival 2024

DOK.fest MÜCHEN 2024

Docs Ireland 2024 Opening Film – Best Irish Documentary Award

65th Festival dei Popoli – Gian Paolo Paoli Award, Best Anthropological Film

Montreal International Documentary Festival 2024 – Panorama Essentials

Irish Film Festival London – Best Feature Documentary

2024 International Documentary Filmfestival Amsterdam – Best of Fests

62FICX Gijon International Film Festival 2024 – Esbilla Here and in another time

Watch Docs Film Festival 2024 – Special Mention for Directing

62FICX Gijon International Film Festival 2024 – Esbilla Here and in another time

FLATPACK Festival, Sheffield

16 May 2025

Bookings closed

Light House Cinema, Dublin

Thurs 22 May 2025

Book here

Irish Film Institute, Dublin

Fri 23 May 2025

Book here

Queens Film Theatre, Belfast

Fri 30 May 2025

Book here

Movie House Cityside, Belfast

Mon 2 June 2025

Book here

Written and directed by  Alessandra Celesia

Director of photography  François Chambe

Edited  by Frédéric Fichefet

Sound engineer  Quentin Jacques

Sound mixing  Gilles Benardeau

Production manager  Jerome Nunes

Postproduction coordinator  Nora Bertone

Producers  Jean-Laurent Csinidis, Geneviève De Bauw, Jeremiah Cullinane, John McIlduff