Gaelic Awareness Month Film Series Debuts

NOTE: A schedule of locations, times and films follows the release.

Unique characters, breathtaking images and great storytelling will highlight an exciting lineup of award-winning Gaelic films from Canada, Scotland and Ireland to be shown around the province in celebration of Gaelic Awareness Month.

Hosted by the Office of Gaelic Affairs, the May and June film series will show local movies like Genie-nominated The Wake of Calum MacLeod, and new feature-length dramas and documentaries such as the first Irish-language feature film, Kings.

"Gaelic-language filmmaking is beginning to flourish on both sides of the Atlantic," said Angus MacIsaac, Minister of Gaelic Affairs. "Filmmakers recognize that a short Gaelic film such as The Wake of Calum MacLeod, has created a great deal of enthusiasm in the Nova Scotia Gaelic community and speaks to the potential for further development of Gaelic films here."

Beginning in Halifax on Sunday, May 25, the film series will screen a feature film and one or two short films in a different location each week, for four weeks. Screenings will also be held in New Glasgow on June 1, Sydney on June 8, and Antigonish on June 15. Admission is free.

The film series includes the regional premiere of Second Sight, a Canadian-Scottish co-production and feature-length documentary by Ontario-based director Alison McAlpine. Set in Scotland's Isle of Skye, Second Sight follows 80-year-old Gaelic storyteller Donald Angus MacLean as he introduces a cast of characters who claim to have had personal contact with the spirit world.

Montreal's Gazette hailed Second Sight as "glorious," and the Globe and Mail declared it one of three must-see documentaries at Toronto's HotDocs film festival last month.

The series will also include:

• The Interrogation of a Highland Lass, set in 1950, chronicling the highly publicized theft of the Stone of Scone from Westminster Abbey
• The Great Book of Gaelic, a documentary that explores the artistic legacy of the Gaels in Scotland and Ireland
• the Scottish-Gaelic short Pìobairean Bhòrnais, a painted-on-glass animation about a boy's desire to learn to play the bagpipes
• Ròs, an Irish Gaelic short set in 1863, about a young girl's journey to find heaven
• Yu Ming is Ainm Dom, a charming film about a Chinese man who studies Gaelic for months, only to discover when he arrives, that it's not widely spoken in Ireland
• Fluent Dysphasia, featuring Stephen Rea as a man who awakes to find he can only speak and understand Irish Gaelic

Presented with the support of Empire Theatres, all films have English subtitles, and are appropriate for all ages, except Kings, which is rated 14A.

The full schedule of the screenings is as follows:

• Halifax
  Sunday, May 25 at 4 p.m.
  Empire Theatres Park Lane
  Short film: Yu Ming Is Ainm Dom
  Feature: Kings

• New Glasgow
  Sunday, June 1 at 4 p.m.
  Empire Theatres
  Short film: Pìobairean Bhòrnais
  Feature: An Ceasnachadh

• Sydney
  Sunday, June 8, at 4 p.m.
  Empire Theatres
  Short film: Ròs
  Feature: The Great Book of Gaelic

• Antigonish
  Sunday, June 15 at 4 p.m.
  Empire Theatres (Capitol Theatre)
  Short film: Faire Chaluim Mhic Leòid
  Short film: Fluent Dysphasia
  Feature: Second Sight