Gerard McSorley

Acting

Gerard McSorley

Born

1950-09-14 (76)

Place of birth

Omagh, County Tyrone, Northern Ireland

Known for

Acting

Credits

56 titles

Gerard McSorley is a theatre, TV and an Irish film actor. He is known for hit films Veronica Guerin, Braveheart & In The Name of The Father. He also known for playing Father Todd Unctious in the Christmas special episode ("A Christmassy Ted") of the sitcom Father Ted. He now resides in County Donegal, he has three children.

Known for

Bergerac poster
7.0

Jim Bergerac is a detective sergeant in The Foreigners Office who likes to do things his own way. While dealing with his own personal demons Bergerac has a knack of finding trouble, and sometimes causing it.

Bergerac

1981

Braveheart poster
7.9

Enraged at the slaughter of Murron, his new bride and childhood love, Scottish warrior William Wallace slays a platoon of the local English lord's soldiers. This leads the village to revolt and, eventually, the entire country to rise up against English rule.

Braveheart

1995

Robin Hood poster
6.4

When soldier Robin happens upon the dying Robert of Loxley, he promises to return the man's sword to his family in Nottingham. There, he assumes Robert's identity; romances his widow, Marion; and draws the ire of the town's sheriff and King John's henchman, Godfrey.

Robin Hood

2010

Shakespeare: The Animated Tales poster
6.5

An animated adaptation of twelve of Shakespeare's best-known plays. The series was produced by S4C for the BBC, but animated by some of the foremost artists of Soyuzmultfilm, the former Soviet Union's main animation studio. Each 26-minute play is directed by a different animator, in a wide variety of styles: cel animation for Macbeth, stop-motion puppets in Twelfth Night, and paint on glass for Hamlet.

Shakespeare: The Animated Tales

1992

In the Name of the Father poster
7.9

A small-time Belfast thief, Gerry Conlon, is wrongly convicted of an IRA bombing in London, along with his father and friends, and spends 15 years in prison fighting to prove his innocence.

In the Name of the Father

1993

The Deep End of the Ocean poster
6.6

A three-year-old boy disappears during his mother's high school reunion. Nine years later, by chance, he turns up in the town in which the family has just relocated.

The Deep End of the Ocean

1999

Film credits

2010s · 5 titles

Robin Hood poster
6.4

When soldier Robin happens upon the dying Robert of Loxley, he promises to return the man's sword to his family in Nottingham. There, he assumes Robert's identity; romances his widow, Marion; and draws the ire of the town's sheriff and King John's henchman, Godfrey.

Robin Hood

2010

War Horse poster
7.3

On the brink of the First World War, Albert's beloved horse Joey is sold to the Cavalry by his father. Against the backdrop of the Great War, Joey begins an odyssey full of danger, joy, and sorrow, and he transforms everyone he meets along the way. Meanwhile, Albert, unable to forget his equine friend, searches the battlefields of France to find Joey and bring him home.

War Horse

2011

Penance poster
5.9

Unequivocal about the need for violence to force Britain out of Ireland, Father Eoin O’Donnell seals the fate of the young and impressionable Antaine by convincing him to fight in the 1916 Rising. Fifty years later, the reappearance of the now-experienced gunman Antaine in a divided Derry throws Father O’Donnell into turmoil. Once allies, the pair are now placed on opposite sides of the same agenda.

Penance

2018

No artwork available
NR

Dance culture brings communities together in 1990s Belfast but there will be consequences.

Fractured City

2016

Lift poster
3.0

Sean's vicious attack leaves a man unconscious and him stranded in an elevator with five others. In the confines of the lift, love has a chance of blossoming - violence has a chance of erupting - Sean has little chance of escape. With his freedom hanging in the balance can the people who fear him offer him one last chance of redemption?

Lift

2016

2000s · 17 titles

The Constant Gardener poster
7.0

Justin Quayle is a low-level British diplomat who has always gone about his work very quietly, not causing any problems. But after his radical wife Tessa is killed he becomes determined to find out why, thrusting himself into the middle of a very dangerous conspiracy.

The Constant Gardener

2005

Veronica Guerin poster
6.7

In this true story, Veronica Guerin is an investigative reporter for an Irish newspaper. As the drug trade begins to bleed into the mainstream, Guerin decides to take on and expose those responsible. Beginning at the bottom with addicts, Guerin then gets in touch with John Traynor, a paranoid informant. Not without some prodding, Traynor leads her to John Gilligan, the ruthless head of the operation, who does not take kindly to Guerin's nosing.

Veronica Guerin

2003

Inside I'm Dancing poster
7.4

Michael is a 24-year-old who has cerebral palsy and long-term resident of the Carrigmore Residential Home for the Disabled, run by the formidable Eileen. His life is transformed when the maverick Rory O'Shea moves in.

Inside I'm Dancing

2004

Bloody Sunday poster
7.2

The dramatised story of the Irish civil rights protest march on January 30 1972 which ended in a massacre by British troops.

Bloody Sunday

2002

Ordinary Decent Criminal poster
6.2

Michael Lynch is a notorious criminal with two wives and a flair for showmanship. He's also a huge embarrassment to the local police, who are determined to bring him down once and for all.

Ordinary Decent Criminal

2000

Blood Creek poster
5.3

A man and his brother on a mission of revenge become trapped in a harrowing occult experiment dating back to the Third Reich.

Blood Creek

2009

Omagh poster
6.6

The movie starts at the 1998 bomb attack by the Real IRA at Omagh, Northern Ireland. The attack killed 31 people. Michael Gallagher one of the relatives of the victims starts an examination to bring the people responsible to court.

Omagh

2005

The Front Line poster
6.4

An African immigrant bank security guard turns the tables on Dublin's nastiest criminals when they force him to be the "inside man" on a bank robbery.

The Front Line

2006

Swansong: Story of Occi Byrne poster
6.3

Born in London to single mum Bridget, Austin Byrne returns with her to her hometown in Ireland as a very young boy and learns that, from family to neighbours to the Church, no-one has a good word to say about either of them.

Swansong: Story of Occi Byrne

2009

Dead Bodies poster
5.6

The return of a vengeful ex-girlfriend sets into motion a series of gruesome events for a hapless Irish bachelor in director Robert Quinn's grim black comedy. Tommy (Andrew Scott) had thought he had seen the last of Jean (Katy Davis) after their recent breakup, but when she returns to stake her claim on Tommy's apartment, the confrontation that ensues makes their previous quarrels look petty by comparison. After leaving the apartment in the head of the fight to cool his head and gather his thoughts, he returns only to find that Jean has died and enlists the aid of his friend Noel (Darren Healy) in ditching the body and ensuring that no one ever finds out what happened.

Dead Bodies

2003

Middletown poster
4.8

Having spent most of his life in religious instruction, Gabriel returns to his hometown as its new preacher. The town is full of drinkers and gamblers, including Jim and Caroline, his younger brother and sister-in-law. Gabriel believes he must save the townspeople, especially Jim and Caroline and their unborn child. In the battle to save their souls, some amazing revelations take place.

Middletown

2007

Tell It to the Fishes poster
8.0

The tide is slowly coming in and Finn, a worthless low-rent hood, has been dropped on an isolated beach, his feet set in concrete. Finn's misery is compounded when Jack, a hard and edgy minor gangster responsible for his predicament, lands a few yards away, feet also set in concrete.

Tell It to the Fishes

2006

No artwork available
NR

A middle aged man, on a package holiday in France with his wife, focuses all his frustrations and discontent onto a local boy who has got under his skin.

Hesitation

2007

The Halo Effect poster
8.0

Fatso is the proprietor of what may be the worst eaterie in the city, and is struggling to keep a sinking ship afloat. His compulsive gambling is getting the better of him and he has to contend with an endless succession of loan sharks and debt collectors. He employs hopelessly incompetent staff and generally manages to keep the entire community around him ticking over. However just as Fatso seems to be getting everything under control, he is faced with a dilemma that could destroy him for good.

The Halo Effect

2004

No artwork available
3.5

Have you ever had a best friend you couldn't stand? Myles has one - Austin - only he's too much of a slacker to do anything about it. In fact, each one of these layabouts is as useless as the other: a pair of thirty-somethings who laze around watching their lives flutter past. Fate, however, has plans to remedy their lack of motivation. Up to their necks in debt, they decide to help a dodgy entrepreneur, Gerard, to create a new landmark in Irish tourism: a Famine Theme Park.

Wide Open Spaces

2009

No artwork available
9.0

An aging criminal, about to pull an armed robbery,reflects on a friend of his: a fellow criminal, who lost his life in a recent robbery attempt,on a woman whom he's been seeing and for whom he has strong feelings and whether or not he should go ahead with the present crime.

Do Armed Robbers Have Love Affairs?

2002

Trapped poster
4.0

When Anton O'Neill returns home after five years at sea, he finds that 1970's Ireland is a radically different place to the one he left behind. Northern Ireland is in flames, and civil unrest has spilled south of the border to his beloved home in County Cavan. Blinded by hatred and misguided patriotism 'Anton' is led into an illicit world of violence and is forced to choose between his family and his country. Hunted and on the run, Anton is drawn into a battle of wills with the law and his former accomplices, ending in a showdown in which he must risk everything to protect the woman he loves.

Trapped

2008

1990s · 22 titles

Braveheart poster
7.9

Enraged at the slaughter of Murron, his new bride and childhood love, Scottish warrior William Wallace slays a platoon of the local English lord's soldiers. This leads the village to revolt and, eventually, the entire country to rise up against English rule.

Braveheart

1995

In the Name of the Father poster
7.9

A small-time Belfast thief, Gerry Conlon, is wrongly convicted of an IRA bombing in London, along with his father and friends, and spends 15 years in prison fighting to prove his innocence.

In the Name of the Father

1993

The Deep End of the Ocean poster
6.6

A three-year-old boy disappears during his mother's high school reunion. Nine years later, by chance, he turns up in the town in which the family has just relocated.

The Deep End of the Ocean

1999

Michael Collins poster
6.9

Michael Collins plays a crucial role in the establishment of the Irish Free State in the 1920s, but becomes vilified by those hoping to create a completely independent Irish republic.

Michael Collins

1996

The Boxer poster
6.7

Nineteen-year-old Danny Flynn is imprisoned for his involvement with the I.R.A. in Belfast. He leaves behind his family and his sixteen-year-old girlfriend, Maggie Hamill. Fourteen years later, Danny is released from prison and returns to his old working class neighborhood to resume his life as a boxer.

The Boxer

1997

Angela's Ashes poster
7.3

An Irish Catholic family returns to 1930s Limerick after a child's death in America. The unemployed I.R.A. veteran father struggles with poverty, prejudice, and alcoholism as the family endures harsh slum conditions.

Angela's Ashes

1999

Some Mother's Son poster
6.8

Based on the true story of the 1981 hunger strike in a British prison, in which IRA prisoner Bobby Sands led a protest against the treatment of IRA prisoners as criminals rather than as prisoners of war. The film focuses on the mothers of two of the strikers, and their struggle to save the lives of their sons.

Some Mother's Son

1996

Widows' Peak poster
6.4

Scandal and mystery reign following the arrival of Edwina in a small Irish town populated entirely by widows. Edwina quickly falls out with the locals while also falling in with the son of the community's leader

Widows' Peak

1994

The Butcher Boy poster
6.8

Francie and Joe live the usual playful, fantasy filled childhoods of normal boys. However, with a violent, alcoholic father and a manic depressive, suicidal mother the pressure on Francie to grow up are immense. When Francie's world turns to madness, he tries to counter it with further insanity, with dire consequences.

The Butcher Boy

1998

An Awfully Big Adventure poster
6.5

Liverpool. 1947. Right after World War II, a star struck naive teenage girl joins a shabby theatre troupe in Liverpool. During a winter production of Peter Pan, the play quickly turns into a dark metaphor for youth as she becomes drawn into a web of sexual politics and intrigue and learns about the grown-up world of the theater.

An Awfully Big Adventure

1995

Dancing at Lughnasa poster
6.0

Five unmarried sisters make the most of their simple existence in rural Ireland in the 1930s.

Dancing at Lughnasa

1998

Felicia's Journey poster
6.3

Seventeen and pregnant, Felicia travels to England in search of her lover and is found instead by Joseph Ambrose Hilditch, a helpful catering manager whose kindness masks an unsettling secret.

Felicia's Journey

1999

Agnes Browne poster
6.2

Set in Dublin in 1967, the story of feisty woman, who along with her seven children, learns to cope with adversity after the unexpected death of her husband.

Agnes Browne

1999

The Serpent's Kiss poster
5.4

A man sends a young architect to build an extravagant garden to bankrupt the husband of the woman he once loved.

The Serpent's Kiss

1997

The Hanging Gale poster
NR

In this historical miniseries created for BBC Northern Ireland, four brothers struggle to survive during the Irish potato famine of the 1840s while facing persecution from an agent (Michael Kitchen) of their indifferent English landlord. Looking on in horror as their primary food source dwindles, the Phelan brothers (portrayed by real-life siblings Joe, Mark, Paul and Stephen McGann) are torn between nonviolent protest and bloody revolt.

The Hanging Gale

1995

Words Upon the Window Pane poster
9.0

In 1928 Dublin, during séances concerning Jonathan Swift, the spirits of his former lovers, Stella and Vanessa, emerge to resume their ancient quarrel.

Words Upon the Window Pane

1994

Who Bombed Birmingham? poster
8.5

Docudrama film exploring the efforts of World in Action researchers Ian MacBride and Chris Mullin in proving that the "Birmingham Six" only admitted to the bombing under extreme duress, and that the five IRA members were in fact responsible for the deadly attacks

Who Bombed Birmingham?

1990

Othello poster
NR

The playwright's most famous dramatic study of jealousy and its tragic effects are conveyed vividly in a striking drawn animation style. The warmth of the Mediterranean contrasts with the coldness in lago's heart as he turns his noble master, Othello, against the beautiful and innocent Desdemona.

Othello

1994

Vicious Circle poster
8.5

Criminal Martin Cahill gets in trouble when a major robbery succeeds. He aims for more trouble when he tries to do a large art robbery

Vicious Circle

1999

Nothing Personal poster
4.8

A raw depiction of the Belfast 'troubles' as savage tribal warfare. Set shortly after the 1975 cease fire, the film focuses on the tribulations of Kenny, Protestant leader of a group of Shankill Road Loyalists, and his one-time friend Liam, a Catholic.

Nothing Personal

1996

No artwork available
NR

An Irish Garda finds himself involved in a complex smuggling operation.

Runway One

1995

No artwork available
NR

Frank is a confident, charming author with a secret mistress in London; a relationship he wants to keep casual. Frank's secret is a burden he bears lightly, but he finds himself increasingly drawn into examining his unworthiness which ultimately horrifies him. Maria, an artist, is his good humoured wife putting a brave face on his neglect. Feeling increasingly emotional and isolated as she approaches middle age, she eventually breaks down admitting her loneliness at Frank's absences. The cathartic point of the film is when Michael, the co-owner of the cottage where they're staying, pays a visit with a woman other than his wife. Not knowing that he has left his wife and has moved in with this other woman, embarrassment and awkwardness increase, straining this social setting. With the illicit couple hot-footing it back to the city, Frank and Maria are left feeling threatened trying to reason the situation, at the midst of which lies Frank's secret.

Just in Time

1998

1980s · 5 titles

Series credits

Bergerac poster
7.0

Jim Bergerac is a detective sergeant in The Foreigners Office who likes to do things his own way. While dealing with his own personal demons Bergerac has a knack of finding trouble, and sometimes causing it.

Bergerac

1981

Shakespeare: The Animated Tales poster
6.5

An animated adaptation of twelve of Shakespeare's best-known plays. The series was produced by S4C for the BBC, but animated by some of the foremost artists of Soyuzmultfilm, the former Soviet Union's main animation studio. Each 26-minute play is directed by a different animator, in a wide variety of styles: cel animation for Macbeth, stop-motion puppets in Twelfth Night, and paint on glass for Hamlet.

Shakespeare: The Animated Tales

1992

The Hanging Gale poster
5.8

The Hanging Gale is a four-episode television serial which first aired on RTÉ One and BBC1 in 1995. The series was a British–Irish co-production, made by Little Bird Films for BBC Northern Ireland in association with Raidió Teilifís Éireann, with support from the Irish Film Board. The serial, set in 1846 at the beginning of Ireland's Great Famine, starred the four McGann brothers: Joe McGann, Paul McGann, Mark McGann and Stephen McGann, and was based on an original idea by Joe and Stephen McGann while researching their family's history. The title of the series comes from the term 'hanging gale', the name for a widespread practice in Ireland at the time, where a landlord would allow new tenants a six-month grace period on payment of their rent, with the expectation that the rent owed would be paid when the land's crops were harvested and sold.

The Hanging Gale

1995

The Last of Summer poster
8.0

A French actress returns to her Irish roots during the last summer before World War II. While there, she must come to grips with her family and the love of two men. Television adaptation of Kate O'Brien's 1943 novel of the same name.

The Last of Summer

1978

Act of Betrayal poster
8.0

An IRA informer and his family are given new identities and new lives in Australia but the IRA are still determined to track them down.

Act of Betrayal

1988

In Search of Ancient Ireland poster
NR

An exploration of Ancient Ireland, from 2000 B.C., when Stone Age farmers built some of Europe's largest and most spectacular Neolithic monuments, to 1167 A.D., when invading Normans seized Ireland for England's king.

In Search of Ancient Ireland

2002