Ardal O'Hanlon Movies

Oh, no! It's the hilariously annoying Father Noel Furlong (Graham Norton) again. The Parochial House foursome has made a rare journey off of Craggy Island on a daytrip, and extreme trouble is right around the corner. Mrs. Doyle (Pauline McLynn) winds up getting arrested, Ted (Dermot Morgan) and Dougal (Ardal O'Hanlon) meet up with Furlong and his ever-present youth group in some "Very Dark Caves," and Dougal becomes worried that his life might be in danger from missing a meal. Will Jack (Frank Kelly) join Mrs. Doyle in the slammer? Bet on it. It's up to Ted to bail them out and get everybody home in one piece. ~ Tim DiGravina, All Movie Guide

When a crop of similar-looking babies starts sprouting up around Craggy Island, Ted (Dermot Morgan) goes about discovering the source of the problem. It seems that the local milkman is being a bit too amorous with the women of the island. After Ted rights matters and costs the milkman his job, it's up to Dougal (Ardal O'Hanlon) to take over the milk delivery duties. But the sacked milkman has a plan of his own in place, and before he knows it, Ted must attempt to save Dougal from a truck rigged with a bomb, à la Keanu Reeves in Speed. Meanwhile, Father Jack (Frank Kelly) has fallen hard for a pet brick. ~ Tim DiGravina, All Movie Guide

TV-star/singer Eoin McLove (Patrick McDonnell), hero to many an elderly woman, injured puppies, and Mrs. Doyle (Pauline McLynn), is paying a visit to Craggy Island, because Mrs. Doyle has won his fabulous poetry competition. Mrs. Doyle is so excited that she lets his arrival date slip out at a grocery store, leading to the invasion of the parish by an army of zombie-like McLove fans. The Fathers must hold down the fort and deal with McLove's imbecilic ways. After the women are sent on their way, McLove cleans the parish of its goodies and is ready to leave in his "cake jumper." Ted (Dermot Morgan) accepts an invitation from McLove's assistant to be a contestant during a trivia portion of McLove's show. Ted aces the questions about his favorite subject, William Shatner's Tekwar, but stumbles with a question about the Pope. ~ Tim DiGravina, All Movie Guide

At the "It's Great Being a Priest Convention '98," Ted (Dermot Morgan) saves a suicidal young priest from jumping off the ledge of a building, impressing Father Buzz Cagney (Jeff Harding) in the process. Cagney invites Ted to work in America, and Ted accepts the offer, thinking that glitz, glamour, and riches will soon be at hand. Ted, Dougal (Ardal O'Hanlon), Jack (Frank Kelly), and Mrs. Doyle (Pauline McLynn) pack their belongings and head to the airport, even though Ted hasn't told his friends that they won't be joining him in America. When Ted learns that he will be dealing with gang members, he decides to stay in Craggy Island rather than become an "umpire to drive-by-shooting tournaments." His friends are happy to stay put "forever, and ever, and ever." (Sadly, Dermot Morgan suffered a fatal heart attack the day after this final episode wrapped shooting. The original broadcast included a highlights montage and a closing where Ted and Dougal say "goodnight" to each other one final time.) ~ Tim DiGravina, All Movie Guide

Neil Jordan directed this adaptation of Patrick McCabe's novel about a boy's struggles with violence and mental illness. Francie Brady (Eamonn Owens) is a young boy growing up in Dublin in the early 1960s, where his life is dominated by his active imagination and his best friend Joe (Alan Boyle). But beneath this benign surface lurks a troubled soul; his father (Stephen Rea) is an embittered alcoholic, his mother (Aisling O'Sullivan) is emotionally unstable and periodically ends up in the local mental hospital (or as she calls it, "the garage," because it's where they take you when you break down), and their next-door neighbor, Mrs. Nugent (Fiona Shaw) often rants that the Bradys are "pigs" not fit to live with. For all their troubles, Francie fiercely loves his parents, and he can't abide Mrs. Nugent's insults. But his playful childhood pranks begin to advance into more destructive and menacing behavior, which leads him to his own stay in "the garage." Branded a lunatic by the community and shorn of his only close friendship when Joe takes up with Mrs. Nugent's son, Francie soon reaches the point of collapse. With nowhere to go, Francie takes an especially awful job as a butcher's assistant, and his overactive imagination goes into overdrive, flooding his mind with images of alien takeover, atomic apocalypse, and the Virgin Mary (Sinead O'Connor) that lead him further down the path toward shocking acts of violence. ~ Mark Deming, All Movie Guide

Dougal (Ardal O'Hanlon) befriends delinquent, young Father Damien Lennon (Joe Rooney). Ted (Dermot Morgan) and Jack (Frank Kelly) travel to a barren picnic area, where they encounter an angry, foul-mouthed couple and the whistle-happy park ranger Benson (Mal Whyte). As Benson sleeps, Damien steals his whistle. Ted travels to town, where he meets villagers who are terrified and enraged at the news of the whistle theft. Damien gives the whistle to Dougal for safe-keeping. When Ted finds it, he confronts Dougal, but Benson arrives with a police officer before Ted gets an explanation from Dougal. Attempting to save himself and/or Dougal, after Dougal tells everyone the whistle is in Ted's pocket, Ted runs out of the room and concocts a bizarre story about an orphan boy, a fallen tree, and horse-wrangling to explain why he has the whistle. Damien is outed as the whistle thief, but not before Ted tells his strange tale. Dougal learns that being cool isn't always the most desirable thing. ~ Tim DiGravina, All Movie Guide

A leaky roof is cause enough for Fathers Ted (Dermot Morgan) and Dougal (Ardal O'Hanlon) to set up a raffle. Bishop Brennan supplies them with a shiny new car for the raffle, but Ted immediately demolishes it with a single hammer, in a mad attempt to correct an imperceptible dent. Ted borrows an identical car from the Dancing Priest (James Benson), who promptly dies of a heart attack. The Fathers fix the raffle so that they'll be able to win the car themselves. The raffle is a success, thanks in part to the gambling-crazed Spinmaster Father Billy (Gerry O'Brien) who gets himself in trouble with loan sharks after buying 2,000 tickets. Things take a turn for the worse when Father Jack (Frank Kelly) totals the car in a drunken rush to get more drink, and the Spinmaster steals all of the raffle money. A tree falling through what's left of the roof adds one final leaky insult to injury. ~ Tim DiGravina, All Movie Guide

Ted (Dermot Morgan) leads Dougal (Ardal O'Hanlon) and a small army of other priests out of the massive lingerie section of a department store. This isn't your mother's lingerie section, though. It's "Ireland's biggest lingerie section." For his ingenuity and leadership, he's to be awarded a Golden Cleric award, since he's seemingly saved the church from a sure-scandal. Ted dreams of bigger and better things and glorious new achievements, but there's a mysterious new priest in town, and nobody quite knows why he's there or who he is. This Father Todd Unctious fellow has plans of his own, and Ted might be a pawn in his scheme. Is he even a priest at all? And for what reason might he want to steal the Golden Cleric award out from under Ted? ~ Tim DiGravina, All Movie Guide

Father Dick Byrne (Maurice O'Donoghue) tricks Craggy Island's most famous sons into giving up their sinful vices for Lent. Ted (Dermot Morgan) has to resist smoking, Jack (Frank Kelly) has to give up "drink," and Dougal (Ardal O'Hanlon) must pack away his inline skates. But old addictions are hard to drop, and the realities of sobriety are too much for the three priests. With withdrawal symptoms driving them toward jitters and insanity, they hire Sister Assumpta (Rosemary Henderson) to set them back on track. Assumpta tries to put the Fathers through a grueling ten-step process, involving ice baths, watery soups, brick bedding, and daily beatings. When Ted learns that they have been led astray by Byrne and that Assumpta has indulged in an ungodly chocolate frenzy, he uses Assumpta to get revenge on Byrne. ~ Tim DiGravina, All Movie Guide