Gaelic noir Primetime gamble pays off for BBC's Irish-language murder mystery

Its setting is remote, desolate, and windy. Its protagonist is a mercurial policeman struggling with his own personal demons. Its subject: a long-lost body found in a mountain bog.

- Lisa O'Carroll

So far, so standard for a television crime drama. But there is something about Crá, a new BBC series that debuted last month, that makes it stand out from the crowd.

It is written in Gaeilge, the first Irish language programme to get a primetime slot on BBC Northern Ireland, and the latest in a small but growing genre of Gaelic noir, dramas that build on Ireland's storytelling and literary canons.

"Everyone was interested in Scandi noir, but we have created a genre of our own right here: Gaelic noir with different elements," said Ciarán Charles, the programme's Connemara-born producer.

"There is the storytelling, a Celtic composer and haunting soundtrack which people seem to respond to. It's original and fresh."

Likened to an Irish take on the Coen brothers' blackly comic crime series Fargo, Crá, which means "torment", is set in the wilderness around Gweedore in Donegal, north-western Ireland.