British Sea Power | Man of Aran (101 Distribution)
Written by Sarah Boslaugh
Tuesday, 16 June 2009
Man of Aran was a silent film, and almost remains so with the
new soundtrack.
In commemoration of the 75th anniversary of Robert
Flaherty's 1934 fictional documentary Man of Aran, the British Film Institute
has released the DVD with a new soundtrack
by the U.K.
indie rock bank British Sea Power. And no, they weren't just selected because
of their name. The album is also available separately, but as it was conceived
as a soundtrack, and my advice is to listen to it that way—otherwise, the
rather atmospheric instrumentals may seem like background with no foreground.
You can get an idea how they work with the film by viewing this clip, or this one .
In the 1920s, Flaherty directed and produced a series of
films which combined elements of fiction and documentary to present stories set
in exotic cultures (from the point of view of his American and European
audiences). These films include Nanook of the North (1922; set among the Inuit
of the Canadian Arctic) and Moana (1926; set among South Sea Islanders). With Man
of Aran, he moved closer to home, filming on the Aran Islands
off the west coast of Ireland
while still documenting a culture which would be foreign to almost anyone
likely to see one of his films. Although the story told in Man of Aran is
fictional and some of the "island customs" antiquated (reportedly, the methods
depicted in the shark-hunting sequence hadn't been used in generations), it was
justly praised as an admiring portrait of people wrestling out a living under
very difficult conditions. The film also documented many authentic island ways
of life which were already disappearing by the 1930s.
Man of Aran was a silent film and almost remains so with the
new soundtrack. The predominant sound is a mixture of Celtic and New Age
instrumentals, suitably moody to match the stunning cinematography of
Flaherty's film. The only song with lyrics (there are wordless vocals on other
cuts) is "Come Wander with Me" written by Jeff Alexander and made famous by
being featured on a Twilight Zone episode; here it's done in an Enya-like, dreamy,
electronic-Celtic style. Not all the album is soothing, however; cuts like
"Spearing the Seafish" can get pretty percussive and dissonant. All in all, the
music works well as a soundtrack (much better than the romanticized and
string-heavy soundtrack usually played with Man of Aran) but doesn't do that
well as a standalone album. B | Sarah Boslaugh
play by play (music) 
Man of Aran was a silent film, and almost remains so with the
new soundtrack.
