Peter Simonischek and Sandra Hüller in Tony Erdmann.

Over the next few weeks, Eden Cinema’s Side Street Films programme will offer a number of movies from Europe, a mix of character study, broad comedy and drama. The critically-acc­laimed and Oscar-nominated Toni Erdmann and Irish comedy The Young Offenders will be screened as from this Wed­nesday, while Italian/French drama Sweet Dreams will be showing at the beginning of March.

The Germany/Austria/Romania co-production Toni Erdmann, written and directed by Maren Ade, is a comedy-drama that traces the fraught relationship between music teacher Winfried (Peter Simonischek) and his high-flying, career-minded daughter Ines (Sandra Hüller). Rebuffed when he heads to Bucharest to visit her, Winfried returns home to Germany, where he undertakes a bold transformation into the audacious, brassy ‘Toni Erdmann’ and barges back into Ines’s life.

As Toni, Winfried is bolder and doesn’t hold back, but Ines meets the challenge. As this new relationship becomes rather frenetic, the two find a mutual understanding that had been missing before.

Bérénice Bejo and Nicolò Cabras in Sweet Dreams.

Dominic Mc Hale in The Young Offenders.

With numerous awards already to its name, including five awards in December’s European Film awards, Toni Erdmann is one of the front-runners for this year’s Best Foreign Language Film Oscar. It has been celebrated by critics the world over, with Peter Travers from Rolling Stone magazine saying that “if you’re looking for the best and most beguiling foreign-language film of the year, you’ll find it in Maren Ade’s German father-daughter story that will leave you laughing and choking back tears, often simultaneously”.

Empire Magazine’s Ian Freer describes the film as a “low-key triumph, especially for writer-director Maren Ade and star Sandra Hüller. A weird, thoughtful, affecting treat”.

A mix of character study, broad comedy, and drama

Inspired by the true story of Ireland’s biggest cocaine seizure in 2007, The Young Offenders is comic road movie from Ireland about best friends Conor and Jock (Alex Murphy and Chris Walley, both in their feature film debuts), two inner-city teenagers from Cork who dress the same, act the same, and even have the same bum-fluff moustaches. When a drug-trafficking boat capsizes off the coast of West Cork and 61 bales of cocaine, each worth €7 million, are seized, word gets out that there is a bale missing. The boys steal two bikes and go on a road trip hoping to find a missing bale that they can sell so as to escape their troubled home lives.

Written and directed by Peter Foote, The Young Offenders is slow­ly but surely making waves on the comedy circuit, winning numerous awards at the Los Angeles Comedy Festival, including Best Feature Film, Best Feature Screenplay and Best Feature Direction.

Alex Murphy and Chris Walley in The Young Offenders.

As from March 8, the tone shifts somewhat from comedy to drama in Sweet Dreams, starring Valerio Mastrandrea and Bérénice Bejo.

Nine-year-old Massimo’s idyllic childhood is shattered by the mysterious death of his mother. The young boy refuses to accept this brutal loss, even if he is told by the local priest that she is now in Heaven. Years later, in the 1990s, Massimo has grown up to become an accomplished journalist. After reporting on the war in Sarajevo, he begins to suffer from panic attacks. As he prepares to sell his parents’ apartment, Massimo is forced to relive his traumatic past, and compassionate doctor Elisa is the key to help the tormented Massimo open up and confront his childhood wounds.

Sandra Hüller in Tony Erdmann.

Directed by Marco Bellocchio and written by Bellocchio, Valia Santella and Edoardo Albinati, based on journalist Massimo Gramellini’s best-selling autobio­graphical novel, Fai Bei Sogni, (Sweet Dreams) explores the effects of trauma on a young child, and how that trauma shapes the man he becomes.

Toni Erdmann and The Young Offenders will be screened at Eden Cinemas under the Side Street Films banner starting from this Wednesday, while Sweet Dreams will begin on March 8.