Eagle of the Ninth - a Braveheart buster in the making

Watching the battle being filmed in Finnich Glen

Summer Isles with Rainbow

Remember the last King of Scotland and its opening scenes on Loch Lomond? Well, the reason may be related to the fact that the Director is a local man, Kevin MacDonald, who kens his childhood haunts with affection. He is currently directing a film - Eagle of the Ninth - based on the book by Rosemary Sutcliff about the lost Roman legion in Scotland. Two thousand years on he has identified some spectacular locations for the shoot of the film. Speaking to the locations manager on set last week, I discovered that they had already filmed extensively in the primaeval scenery near Achiltibuie where mountains jump out of the ground and mesmerise you and where the seascapes are decorated by the challengingly named Summer Isles - see the evening rainbow there taken this summer.

The last two weeks have been on location in the Stirling area at the Devil's Pulpit in the Finnich Glen near Croftamie and at Touch estate near Stirling. The filming at the Devil's Pulpit involved a huge circus of caravans, vehicles, Hungarian stuntmen, rain making equipment (how daft is that in this part of the world) and was the setting for a bloody battle between the Seal people and the Romans in the river gorge. A funeral pyre was also burning whilst I was there. I am seen to the left of the person with the large bum in the photo. Filming continues over the next three weeks at Loch Lomond and then back north to Applecross and Loch Maree. Should be worth watching for the scenery if not the casting, which seems to have been cobbled together for the American market.