Heinrich Boll's book of his impressions of Ireland from the 1950s, published fifty years ago, has aged well and is still a bestseller among German literature about Ireland. His film on Ireland is basically forgotten. In this paper I will analyse the relationship between Heinrich Boll's influential Irisches Tagebuch (Irish Journal) and his film Irland und seine Kinder broadcast in Germany in 1961 and in Ireland (under the title Children of Eire) in 1965. I will examine the nature and possible cause of the divergent reception of the film in Germany compared with that in Ireland at the time and now.(1)