The Future Tense

Having lived contentedly in England for over 30 years, but now reeling from recent seismic changes to the political landscape, two Dublin-born filmmakers and their London-born daughter are forced to consider a move back home, across the water, to Ireland. They reflect upon two urgent existential questions about their idea of home: do they have a future here in England?; and can they imagine returning to Ireland to live?

Positioning themselves wryly at the centre of the documentary as authors/narrators/immigrants, the filmmakers explore identity through personal memoir (Joe’s parents emigrated to London in the late 1950s); political history (in the figure of 1970s radical Rose Dugdale); through the central role of the Famine in Irish memory; and through their daughter, Molly, a living embodiment of dual national identity. Such criss-crossing of narrative threads adds much to the energy, ideas, and brilliant dry humour that drive this film.