Movie epic to showpiece Ireland's attractions

Multi-million euro epic movie Tristan and Isolde is expected to attract more films to shoot on Ireland’s western shores after it opens in cinemas across Europe this week.

Film chiefs said the scenes shot for Sir Ridley Scott’s medieval epic in Ireland will show the unique countryside to the the world.

The film, starring Sophia Myles as Isolde and James Franco as Tristan, filmed scenes in Connemara, at Ballinahinch Castle, Delphi Lake, Glassillaun Beach, King’s Beach and Lough Nafooey.

Naoise Barry, film commissioner with the Irish Film Board, said the movie was the first major Hollywood production to shoot in the west of Ireland since The Field in 1990 and The Quiet Man in 1952.

“While The Field shot in the same neck of the woods as Tristan and Isolde, it didn’t show off the coastline to the same extent,” he said. “I can’t really think of a film in the last 20 or 30 years that shows off the West Coast to that extent. it may be a significant catalyst in creating some tourism traffic to the Mayo and Galway coastline.”

Mr Barry said: “In the main the majority of film production occurs on the east coast.”

The film commissioner said the movie would make producers and the public more aware of what the west of Ireland has to offer when it opens in the UK and European cinemas this week.

“I have seen the film, it looks fantastic,” he said. “Ridley and Tony Scott had a very positive experience working here. The film has done great at the US box office, and they have high expectations for how it will perform in its UK and Europe release.”

Mr Barry revealed he hopes the success of the shoot would have a knock-on effect in attracting other Hollywood directors to shoot along the rugged coastline.

He said it had been a complicated shoot but the National Parks and Widelife Service aided in filming in the environmentally protected areas.

Sir Ridley, of Gladiator fame, said the myth originated as a Celtic legend from the Dark Ages, between the fall of the Roman Empire and the Renaissance.

The medieval legend of Tristan and Isolde sees the young lovers become doomed against the forces of royal politics. English knight Tristan wins the hand of Isolde, the daughter of an Irish King, for his own leader, threatening peace in the region.

The director, Kevin Reynolds, spent months scouting Romania, France, Scotland and England before choosing the west coast of Ireland and the Czech Republic.

“In many ways, we’re creating a place which in fact does not exist,” said Reynolds. “So we looked to marry the best of Ireland and the best of the Czech Republic into this fabricated, imaginary place.”

After choosing wild and rugged areas to create the Dark Ages-era, the producers, which included Morgan O’Sullivan and James Flynn in Octagon Films, said the remoteness and changeable weather provided challenges for the production.

Reynolds said the set of Isolde’s father, King Donnchadh’s castle, was built on a small island on the west coast of Ireland on the beaches of Glassillaun, Co Galway.

“We really wanted a feeling that this place has been here for an awfully long time, so we tried to blend the castle into the landscape, because that’s what the people would have been influenced by,” production designer Mark Geraghty said.

“And also the weather. We had to build something that would stand up to the winds and the hardship that they would have endured in real life.”

The producers said the tragic story about forbidden love came long before the legend of Arthur and Guinevere in Camelot and Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.