The Quiet Girl

Cáit is a nine year-old girl from an over-crowded, dysfunctional and impoverished family. Quietly struggling at school and at home, she has learnt to hide in plain sight from those around her. As summer arrives and her pregnant mother’s due date approaches, Cáit is sent to live with distant relatives. Without knowing when she will return home, she is left at the strangers’ house with only the clothes she is wearing. The Kinsellas, a middle-aged couple she has never met, are farming people, like her own, but hard-working and wanting for nothing, it seems. Despite a warm reception from the woman, the man of the house keeps his distance from Cáit and she from him, but over time, their strained relationship begins to deepen. Slowly, in the care of the Kinsellas, Cáit blossoms and discovers a new way of living. But in this house where affection grows and there are meant to be no secrets, she discovers one painful truth.

Colm Bairéad

Born in Dublin and studied film at the Dublin Institute of Technology. His first short film was Mac an Athar (His Father’s Son), a semi-autobiographical film about an Irish-speaking family in Dublin, which enjoyed success on the international festival circuit. His documentary output has earned him numerous international and Irish Film & Television Academy Award nominations and wins. In 2012, he received a distinction from the Screen Directors’ Guild of Ireland for his “outstanding work as a director in the Irish language”. In 2022, he was the recipient of the Aer Lingus Discovery Award and the Screen Ireland-IFTA Rising Star Award. The Quiet Girl is Colm’s feature film debut. It is the highest grossing Irish-language film of all time and one of the most critically and commercially successful Irish films of recent years, as well as Ireland’s official entry for Best International Feature Film at the 95th Academy Awards.