An Island Parish, BBC2 - TV review: An insight into a resourceful and close-knit community

 There were some brilliantly odd floats for the carnival procession, including one with dogs wearing shower caps. 

Sally Newall
Monday 21 March 2016 23:11 GMT
Comments
An Island Parish
An Island Parish (BBC)

Your support helps us to tell the story

From reproductive rights to climate change to Big Tech, The Independent is on the ground when the story is developing. Whether it's investigating the financials of Elon Musk's pro-Trump PAC or producing our latest documentary, 'The A Word', which shines a light on the American women fighting for reproductive rights, we know how important it is to parse out the facts from the messaging.

At such a critical moment in US history, we need reporters on the ground. Your donation allows us to keep sending journalists to speak to both sides of the story.

The Independent is trusted by Americans across the entire political spectrum. And unlike many other quality news outlets, we choose not to lock Americans out of our reporting and analysis with paywalls. We believe quality journalism should be available to everyone, paid for by those who can afford it.

Your support makes all the difference.

An Island Parish took proceedings way north. Unst, in the Shetland Islands, is the focus of this 10th series, and it's actually closer to Oslo than London. From watching this gentle show, you'd think nothing had changed up there in the past 50 years.

Despite ostensibly focusing on the work of the community's church, the Reverend David Cooper didn't feature much. Instead, we got the run up to UnstFest, the Island's annual shindig that included a stone-skimming contest for the first time. Those guys meant business, some got up to 10 bounces. The poor Rev could only manage two. There was also some brilliantly odd floats for the carnival procession, including one that involved dogs wearing shower caps.

It was certainly a good insight into the friendly, resourceful, close-knit community. “It's not like you get in the middle of Birmingham, is it?” said Heather, a retired school teacher, as she looked out at the North Sea glinting in the sun. You certainly don't, but I would have liked to see more of Unst in 2016, the post-referendum politics, as well as the ponies and processions.

Join our commenting forum

Join thought-provoking conversations, follow other Independent readers and see their replies

Comments

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged inPlease refresh your browser to be logged in