The Irish Archive Movie Map

The Irish Film Institute has launched a fascinating interactive map exploring one of Ireland’s most distinctive cinematic time capsules: the Amharc Éireann cinema newsreels. The Archive Player Map plots 250 stories from the series across the island of Ireland, allowing users to browse the films geographically and discover how different towns, cities and landscapes appeared on cinema screens during the 1950s and early 1960s.

Gael Linn was founded in 1953 with the aim of promoting Irish language and culture. One of its earliest and most innovative projects was cinema newsreels. That project became Amharc Éireann (“View of Ireland”).The first Amharc Éireann films began screening in 1956 and quickly became a regular feature in cinemas across Ireland.

The IFI’s new Archive Player Map transforms this historic newsreel series into a spatial archive. Instead of browsing the films as a chronological list, the interactive map allows users to explore the stories geographically. Pins scattered across the island mark the locations where individual newsreel segments were filmed. Click a location and you can immediately watch the associated story.

Interactive maps have become a popular way for archives to surface location-based collections, and the IFI’s Archive Player Map shows why the format works so well.

Also See:

Britain on Film - the BFI's map provides an amazing way to step back in time and view historical film footage of locations throughout the UK

British Pathé Locations - groups the British Pathé collection of global newsreels (1896–1976) by specific countries and cities

WSB-TV newsfilm collection map - the Digital Library of Georgia map of local news footage (1950s–1980s)

Universal Newsreels - the Internet Archive hosts a collection of roughly 600 public domain Universal Newsreels (1929–1967). Not mapped yet!