Interview with director Mark O'Connor: Historical Movies, Amongst the Wolves and Barry Keoghan

Amongst the Wolves releases in Ireland and the UK on 2nd May 2025!

We're joined by acclaimed director Mark O'Connor - writer and director of Between the Canals and Cardboard Gangsters - shortly before the release of his new film Amongst the Wolves.

We go through Mark's favourite historical movies, his process and experience as a writer director and some of the possible future projects he's working on, including a historical epic about the 1798 Irish uprising and a movie about the Dubliners.

Plus he tells us how he found a young Barry Keoghan and gave him his first acting opportunity.

We also touch on the world of guerilla film-making, the role of realism and morality in Mark's movies and we talk through his upcoming revenge drama Amongst the Wolves.

We’d love to hear from you so drop us a line at historicalmoviespodcast@gmail.com or leave us a comment on our YouTube Channel if you’d like to get in touch!

00:00 El Vino did Flow

00:27 Intro

01:59 Mark's favourite Historical Movies

05:15 Screen writing and directing

10:39 1798 film project

13:09 Realism in Mark's movies and in historical films

15:37 Do directors make their best movies first?

18:04 The Dubliners film project - how the Dubliners nearly died!

20:09 How the movie industry is changing - cinemas close, AI expanding

24:59 Movie budgets and how to make a movie on a shoestring

29:20 How Mark 'discovered' Barry Keoghan

34:02 Bryce praises The New World

34:32 Ros obsesses over Barry Lyndon

35:04 Amongst the Wolves - Mark's new film

40:48 Outro