Although We Were Here could be caught at a few cinemas earlier this year, lots of us were able to see it on iplayer and on TV when word of mouth spread about it; which it did, and fast.  As a film it is knockout moving, remembering the AIDS epidemic in San Francisco, and telling the story of the gay Castro District from the early 1970s to the late 1980s.

I wonder if Derek Jarman would have reached the audience he did without the invention of Channel 4? Certainly a whole generation would never have had that first chance to see Jarman’s work had it not been for that famous early UK TV Channel. In a recent piece for Beige magazine, Mike Nicholls said that Jubilee should be compulsory viewing for all British 14 year olds, and just as it was in 1977, it is relevant today. Nicholls is right.

Even looking at the cover for this DVD release, I kind of knew that if I watched it I would be seeing KD Lang naked. I don’t know why this was, perhaps something about her expression told me I had better beware.

I do like KD Lang though and I couldn’t wait to see her act, especially with someone of high European pedigree as Rosel Zech, and the experience wasn’t wasted; Salmonberries is a film which anyone can relate to, because it is about isolation and coming to terms with yourself, with all of this happening in distant and almost alien Alaska.