The Eclipse, Irish writer- director Conor McPherson's third feature, screened to enthusiastic reviews on its world premiere at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York this week. Written by McPherson and fellow playwright Billy Roche, and shot in Cobh, Co Cork, this supernatural love story is set in an Irish town during a literary festival.

"McPherson has craftily woven themes of grief, love and the possibility of the unknown into this closed, small-town world – a magical place that characters and audiences alike can easily inhabit," commented the Hollywood Reporter.

Declaring Ciarán Hinds and Aidan Quinn "as good here as they've ever been", Varietycalled The Eclipse"a film of such seductive grace, humour and startling side trips into buttocks-clenching ghastliness that audiences won't know what to make of it (although it won't keep them from wanting to visit Ireland immediately)."

Meanwhile, Thomas Hefferon's The Confession, set in 1970s Ireland, is one of four shorts selected from the 45 showing at Tribeca to be showcased on the festival's web channel.