Letter to Lia

A creative rumination on the identity of children growing up in a changing Northern Ireland from the starting point of the filmmaker’s own daughter.

Lia Cianetti-Larkin was born into a post-conflict society in the middle of a global pandemic. The Belfast-born child of an Italian mother and a Southern Irish father, Lia has British, Irish and Italian passports.

What will it mean to be Northern Irish for Lia’s generation, born long after the Good Friday Agreement? What does the conflict mean to the immigrants who’ve chosen to make their lives in Northern Ireland? And as Covid slowly recedes after two hard years, what will the long-term effects be for those born during the pandemic? How will we explain this strange time to them in years to come?

Letter to Lia is Nicky Larkin’s most personal work to date, a message to his daughter in the future, from us - here and now in the past.