Courtesy of Scottish Screen Archive

An evocative account, inspired by Robert Flaherty's Man of Aran (1934), of the lives of the Gaelic speaking inhabitants of Eriskay, a remote island in the Scottish Hebridean archipelago, made by German aristocrat Werner Kissling during a three months sojourn on the island to collect the traditional songs and photograph the local 'blackhouse'.

Kissling, born in Silesia in 1895, was a professional soldier and diplomat. Political differences with the new regime in Germany led him to quit his post with their diplomatic service in London in 1934 and devote his life to his hobby of photographing and sketching the lives of the Hebridean islanders of the north west fringes of Scotland. He made only one film, Eriskay: A Poem of Remote Lives (1935), shot on silent stock, with Gaelic dialogue, music and narrative added later in a London studio. The funds raised at the London premiere of the film in 1935 were given to the people of Eriskay, who used the money to build the road that stills serves as the only route across the island today. Kissling never returned to Germany but settled in Scotland pursuing his still photography and ethnographic collecting. He died in 1988 aged 83. This is believed to be the earliest film with Gaelic language dialogue.

Janet McBain

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