It depends on which form of kung-fu you're talking about. There are many, and each have their own set of skills they attempt to teach. If it's an internal form of kung-fu like Taiji, Hsing-I, or Bagua, no you can't do it without an instructor (yes, you can imitate the motions, but internal martial arts are about what you're doing that we can't see, so it's hard to get from a video alone).
External forms of kung-fu that have "soft" skills that require sensing and feeling, no you can't do it without an instructor. I'm talking about Wing Chun, Northern or Southern Praying Mantis, Snake style, etc.
About the only form of kung-fu you can sort of learn on your own is going to be an external "hard" form, like Northern Long-fist.
There are plenty of videos teaching traditional kung-fu solo forms. You can watch them and teach yourself to repeat the movements as you see them. Maybe you could video yourself and correct yourself. With diligence and attention to detail, it's possible you can perform the form semi-competently.
Most people can't do this very well and only embarrass themselves when they show what they've done to people who have learned it in person from a qualified instructor.
Actually, it's worse than that. When you ultimately do find an instructor, he might find that you've picked up a lot of bad habits, and he will have to spend a lot more time with you undoing some of your training. This is why correction as you go is important.
I'm sure there are other things besides forms that you can learn from video as well, like "stance drills", "pole stepping", standing meditation, horse stance holding, punching bag drills, etc.
It's very important that you video yourself so you can see if your posture is correct. An instructor could take one look at you and tell you what you're doing wrong. Your untrained eye will struggle to find those details.
Getting back to internal/external and hard/soft... The reason why you want to avoid styles that are internal and/or soft is that those styles require a lot more hands-on feeling that you can only get from a good instructor. You won't be able to pick it up from reading about it or from watching videos. If you try to get it on your own without an instructor, you'll probably end up convincing yourself you understand it, but you're probably going to be wrong.
Also, as you advance in external/hard styles of kung-fu, you'll find that they're not entirely external or hard. Instructors of those styles eventually teach you more soft skills and maybe even stuff that would be considered internal. You can't get that from videos, so you're going to reach your limit on what you can hope to achieve from learning by videos alone.
The other thing to consider is that this is mostly solo training. Some of the more important things you'll get from learning a martial art you'll only be able to get while working with a partner. The obvious thing is sparring. From day one in most kung-fu schools, you're going to be practicing punches and blocks with a partner in class. Later on, they teach joint locking techniques, sweeps, and throws. They also extract self-defense techniques from the forms and then teach them with partners. Beyond that, they might also teach push-hands and other forms of soft-skill techniques.
All of those require a partner. And in my opinion, that's where it starts to get interesting. Punching to the air is not very interesting to me. You can make it look cool and impress people with your form, and that's fine, but it's not fighting or learning how to fight. It's just repeating movement like a human DVR. When you learn skills that you can actually use in a fight, if you're like me, that's all you'll want to learn. You'll be like, "Teach me that thing you did where you locked his hand with your arm pit and then did something where he ended up flying backwards on his ass."
But that's my opinion. What you get out of it is up to you.
One other suggestion. You mentioned you don't have any schools that teach what you want nearby. Maybe not, but you might still post something to craigslist or Facebook, Meetup.com, etc. requesting same-minded people to join you. And look around for anyone even a little trained in what you want who would be willing to meet with you and introduce you to the style he/she learned. It's worth a shot.
As for specific videos to learn from, that's highly subjective. My advice is to see what's available on Youtube for free. Chances are someone has posted some high quality material to actually teach kung-fu. Aside from that, you can look at shaolin monks who have their own video series. I can vouch for Shi De Yang, for example. Wing Lam Enterprises has a truckload of instructional video (mostly Hung-Gar, I believe). Take your pick. There are thousands of video series to try. Some will be better at teaching you, because they'll be better quality video (in focus, not blurry, etc.) and will show the technique at normal speed, then slow, then talk about all of the aspects of it, etc. And if you're lucky, they'll even go over the self-defense applications of the form.
Again, which one you select is going to have to be up to you and your preferences. If you ask others which ones they like, you'll get a different response for each person you ask.
By the way, I've answered similar questions in the past, but my answers have typically assumed they were able to pay to travel and train at a school for a week or so at a time. You specifically said you don't have the money to do that. So you're stuck where you are. But I just wanted to post links to my other answers. Maybe you or someone else would benefit:
Training martial arts in china
Learning grappling without an instructor
What is the best way to learn Wing Chun?
Hope that helps.
