District 9

A little like the alien spacecraft that adorns the poster this film seems to have arrived out of nowhere. Who would have thought that South Africa would be the breeding ground for a top-notch alien-politico-docu-buddy-flick (catchy, eh)? As one of the narrating voices says at the beginning, people would have expected first contact to happen in a city like New York rather than Johannesburg but it is here that an alien ship came to a halt almost 30 years ago bringing not laser beams and alien invasion but close to a million alien refugees in need of help. Referred to perjoratively as 'prawns' they now live in the titular shanty-town, looked upon by many of Johannesburg's human residents as a burden they would rather see jet off back home or shipped off elsewhere.

The private company in charge of policing them are MNU (Multi National United) who are looking to exploit the potential of the alien weaponry which so far is useless, the alien's DNA being integral to its functioning. The film begins as MNU are preparing to serve the aliens with eviction notices before moving them forcibly to District 10, a purpose-built camp 240 miles away from the city. We follow Wikus Van De Merwe, played by Sharlto Copley in what is his first major acting role (it won't be his last - not just because I think he's marvellous but because I see he will be playing Capt. 'Howling Mad' Murdoch in the feature film of The A Team), as he heads the operation but intercut with that documentary and news footage we hear from various people involved, talking about it all as a past event, and we know from what they say that something goes very wrong.

When he is sprayed by some kind of fluid during a search Wikus begins a transformation. Anyone familiar with The Fly will understand what I mean and also have a good idea of the kind of special effects, not to mention the feeling of unease. What works so well here is that Wikus goes from a tank-top-wearing company man who regards prawns as a bureaucratic nuisance, to someone reliant on them for their help and protection. Given what his assimilation of alien DNA could mean to MNU he becomes a fugitive and the pace is frenetic, perhaps running away with itself towards the end where it becomes just like any other action thriller. It's most interesting moments come with the clever intercutting of different film stocks and perspectives, the distinctly weird way that man and alien have to work together, and the obvious significance of themes like segregation, dehumanisation and violence in a post-apartheid South Africa. All of this ignores the humour and the few tender moments that also dot the film; this is a man after all who wants nothing more than to be back with his wife again and that is the motivation behind all of the film's action.

In the age of identikit thrillers and action movies the set-up of this one is sufficiently interesting, and its execution in the first hour-and-a-bit original enough to warrant attention. It certainly heralds a promising future for its lead actor and director Neill Blomkamp

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'sometimes you have to believe before you can see'

The Blasphemer

by Nigel Farndale

Richard Dawkins raises the hackles of plenty of people with his manner as much as his standpoint (I was going to say beliefs then, but I know he would get angry with me for using a word like that for what he would consider nothing less than FACTS) and those who have belief and faith might even have found themselves in a darker moment placing him at the mercy of a life-threatening situation to see whether it might provoke if not a change of heart at least a little humility. In his ambitious debut novel Farndale does just that by placing Daniel Kennedy, nematologist, a kind of Dawkins b-team (literally at one point when he is bumped off a TV panel when the man himself becomes available), and aerophobe into a plane crash on his way to the Galapagos Islands with long term partner Nancy. The man of reason and science is forced to confront the basis of what he holds to be true when he is helped on his way to swimming over 20 miles of open sea, against the odds, to get help for the floating survivors. What is he helped by? A vision? A hallucination? An angel?

Daniel's adherence to atheism and science finds its root in his rejection of God at the age of five when his mother died of cancer. Since then he has made sensible decision after sensible decision, based on the evidence, making steady progress within Trinity college as he heads towards professorship, building a family unit without the validation of marriage and yet, and yet. The trip to the Galapagos is a surprise for Nancy on their 10th anniversary and he has plans to finally place a ring on that finger and make it all official until fate intervenes and sends them plummeting into the Carribbean.

Farndale has the tension ramped up pretty high for the whole flight, Daniel's fear of flying being put to the test by withdrawing the medication he would usually take to tranquillise himself. With the accident itself and the aftermath he shows himself to be adept at conveying a real sense of crisis and also cleverly creates the personal event that will come between Daniel and Nancy. The power of evolutionary concepts like 'fight or flight' and 'survival of the fittest' is laid bare when Daniel climbs over Nancy to escape the sinking plane.

With a scrum-half's hand-off that flattened her nose and dragged her lips sideways, he pushed her cheek and jaw into the headrest. It was a reflex, visceral action slowed down by the water; and adrenal moment they would both replay time and again, always with he same damning frame frozen in time.

Despite coming back, oxygen replenished, to rescue her and then making the swim of his life to raise the alarm for the rest of the survivors, this single moment comes down like a barrier between them and the shockwaves on their relationship are nicely realised. That marathon swim contains one of several moments of fragile reality.

Then he saw him. A young man with a lapidary smile and protrudent wide-set eyes was treading water no more than ten yards away, gently beckoning with his hand. Delicate boned, olive-skinned and with contour, quiddity and mass, the man was completely present, yet could not be. Only his head and shoulders were visible - he wasn't wearing a life vest - and in the trough that followed a cresting wave he disappeared.

The fact that this vision occurs at a time when Daniel was trying to remove his own life-vest is what gives it its sense of protectiveness. When he continues to see that face afterwards he cannot help but examine what might be possible, even within the realms of science. As one of his colleagues puts it:

The mind of the scientist is open to all possibilities. Take the uncertainty of the subatomic world. It is supposedly full of fluctuations that apply to space-time as well. So up and down, left and right, even past, present and future are no longer as predictable at the subatomic level. The past could walk into the present. Your great grandfather Daniel, or yours Wetherby, could walk into this room right now.

There is something rather convenient about alighting on Daniel's great-grandfather as the other major storyline that runs through the book, which I haven't even begun to touch on yet concerns that very man, Andrew Kennedy, and his experience fighting at Ypres and beyond. The description of fear before going over the top has echoes in that fear of flying mentioned earlier and Farndale develops his themes of heroism and cowardice in both strands and indeed in their sub-plots. In fact if I have a criticism of the book it is that it seeks to do too much. There is a storyline involving a possible alternate opening to Mahler's ninth symphony, a Machiavellian vice-provost within the university whose deep religious faith is matched by his extraordinary, vindictive wickedness towards those he seems to hold closest to him, a clumsy post-9/11 terrorist thread that threatens to turn the ending of the book into an airport thriller and plenty more besides. I mention all of these not to spoil any plot but to show the sheer prevalence of it. I personally would have enjoyed just following the trajectories of Daniel and his great grandfather as they struggle to deal with their most human instincts in times of crisis, as it is here that Farndale writes best and takes some bold creative steps in uniting his themes and images. It is brave to attempt a book of this scale as a first novel and it would be unfair of me to pick holes in it, there is enough here to show that Farndale can write, you just have to pick your way through some treacherous terrain to see it.

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'a duet with absence'

Madame Verona Comes Down The Hill
by Dimitri Verhulst

After a childhood spent in foster care and institutes Verhulst wrote stories and novels that dealt with his youth, finally breaking through with a novel called Problemski Hotel which focused on the lives of residents in an asylum-seeker's centre in Belgium. Changing tack completely with this novella he has written something that reads like a fable of old, a paean to love and loneliness, a book which seems to have a random structure but which slowly and successfully assembles itself into a portrait of an isolated community.

The Madame Verona of the title has lived with her husband, Mr Potter, in a house that sits on a hill overlooking the village of Oucwegne, 'a gutter in the earth's crust'. Brought together by music, he a conductor, she a pianist, they have lived in an artistic isolation which many in the village expected to end when Mr Potter hung himself from a tree in the forest, unwilling to allow his fatal illness to run its course. But his final act beforehand had been to cut and collect as much firewood as he could, allowing his wife to perform one last act in his memory. The novella starts almost at its ending.

It had seemed like an inexhaustible supply, but that morning in February Madame Verona had laid the last log on the fire. The last piece of firewood that he too had held in his splinter-pierced hands. There had been less and less to hold that he too had held, because if things don't rot, they break, and when she pushed that last log deeper into the fire with the poker, she decided to go down the hill. As a symbol, a meaningless act set opposite a meaningless fact, but more beautiful.

Her descent towards the village is an important event, especially for the men. Not only is she an uncommonly beautiful woman but Oucwegne is a village beset by a kind of curse; all the children born, bar one, have been male. The men have had to content themselves with trips to the nearest town and its whorehouses to satisfy their yearning for coupling but for many men the return of Madame Verona heralds the chance to capture the highest prize. When it is known that Madame has had the tree from which her husband hanged himself cut down it seems that she has finished her mourning and will return to the village soon.

Silence is often more intense after its return. When a tree accepts its defeat. creaks and capsizes, all life flies up and off. There's crowing and cawing, branches crack, it rains feather and down, rabbits flee to their underground shelters. All things considered the titan's contact with the actual ground is quiet, people generally expect it to be louder. It's mainly the rest of the forest that kicks up a fuss and makes a racket. And once the creatures have assessed the damage, silence comes back. Eyes and leaves turn to the light that has never shone so brightly here. A place has come free, the struggle can begin, because the space will be occupied by something or someone. It's like that for trees, it's like that for people.

But she has plans for the tree. She instructs a luthier to fashion her husband's beloved instrument, the cello, from the wood. The tree having been freshly cut, it will take time for the wood to dry and season but Madame has not only patience but enough firewood to last her the twenty year wait.

That sense of community I mentioned is created in several ways. There is the social aspect, the village united in its love of drink and table football, social standing and grievances worked out on that enclosed green surface. There are the professional/personal relationships, for example the nearest doctor being a journey away the village have tended to rely on the vet for their medical needs. The fact that many of the older men of the village knew her as the little daughter of the sweet-shop owner adding to their embarrassment when it comes to examination. There is also a great section that explains the time when a cow was made mayor, an episode that typifies that feel of fable and the skill with which Verhulst is able to say so much about village life with so little. At only 145 generously-spaced pages this book does what all good fables should: keeps its strong themes running throughout and fills your mind with images and character. After such a volte-face it is intriguing to think what Verhulst might write next. I see that he has also written poetry and one other standout moment for me was a verse written by Mr Potter for Madame. All of which makes Verhulst seem like a Belgian Adam Foulds. I wonder what he'd make of that.

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'what happened to our dreams?'

Fists
by Pietro Grossi

Pushkin Press don't only bring neglected European writers from the past back into print or into English translation they also publish the works of current European writers so that we can sample what is current on the continent. Grossi's collection of three extended stories is described on the cover as 'a perfect book' by Il Sole 24 Ore, which is one of those quotes that sounds fantastic the first time you read it and then less and less like the all encompassing compliment it seemed with each successive glance. No matter, especially as the cover itself was so pleasant to glance at and more than appropriate given my current involvement in a show which is all about horses. Inside we learn that Grossi has been writing since the age of 8 and admires writers like Hemingway, Salinger and Faulkner. Those influences are felt pretty heavily and I hope I sound fair if I say that Grossi doesn't always emerge from under them. I don't want to be too damning on what is after all only his second book. We have become so drunk on the heavily publicised 'stunning debut' that new writers must find it hard to find the space to learn, to make mistakes and to grow.

The first story, Boxing, is as you might expect the one which brings Hemingway to mind. As you might hope from any story about pugilists we are introduced to two distinctive fighters, with very different back stories who then come together on that square of canvas to fight it out. I won't tell you the result of course but you only need to have watched Rocky to know that victory is relative. Our narrator is known amongst his peers as The Dancer, his fancy footwork and speed around the ring having marked him out as the best in his class despite never having fought competitively at all due to his mother's insistence that he train only (Grossi is in no hurry to disabuse us of our stereotyped ideas about Italian boys and their mothers). Having never been put to the test he has the confidence of a superhero, impervious to the fists of mere mortals. All that will be put to the test when he meets The Goat, a fighter who has earned his name in the ring by always 'moving forwards with his head down', is a deaf mute who learns the name of The Dancer by reading it on the lips of every other kid in the gym.

And this legend has been started by people who had all their five senses...think now about about a deaf person, think about someone who, in order to put together the same picture is forced to gather bits an pieces here and there, wherever he finds them. What are you left with then? You're left with that bloody name that jumps from mouth to mouth and bounces around your head like a stone; always preceded and followed by knowing and admiring looks, until you're going out of your mind.

When the showdown occurs Grossi does a good job of keeping the action engrossing but also of making it a story about more than just the big fight. If there is something that links all three stories in the collection (apart from them all having two male protagonists) it is the coming of age theme. For The Dancer especially it is about putting his reputation and comfortable life aside to stand on his own two feet, to test himself as much as his opponent.

I realised suddenly that we were the same breed: both outcasts, both uncool, two boys who were fighting for their lives, for that dirty square fragment of reality where things happened the way they were supposed to and everything fell into place. And suddenly part of me understood that neither of us could win, that both of us could only lose.

It is two brothers whom we follow in Horses, both gifted a mare by their father out of the blue one day and both following wildly differing trajectories as a result. Nathan and Daniel have to have them tamed first and their penury forces them into a Karate Kid style work-for-knowledge arrangement with a neighbour. When this is accomplished Nathan uses his as a means to get to the city and away from his family home. Daniel however becomes settled by his horse and finds his interest in them growing, acquiring another and looking to breed them both. Perhaps surprisingly it is the boy who remains at home who runs into conflict and an act of violence with life-long repercussions. It is difficult to know whether it is Grossi or his translator Howard Curtis who is to blame but it was during this story that I began to feel that I was reading the work of a writer still finding their feet. Cliched metaphors such as the 'white-hot dagger' of pain are bad enough but seem even clumsier when they become a 'red-hot dagger' over the page. However the story does successfully continue similar themes from Boxing and use a single event to show two very different characters learning something about themselves.

Finally The Monkey diverges from its two predecessors and sets up the scenario of Nico discovering that his friend Piero has begun acting like a monkey. It is the weakest story in the book mainly because it replays the same conversation a few times, as Nico explains to various people what his friend is doing, which is met each time with a fairly non-plussed and unenlightening response. It is an interesting idea which never approaches its potential.

I may not have been knocked out by Grossi on this one but I hope that he continues to be nurtured as a talent. He shows on more than one occasion the kind of insight and understanding into the relationships between boys as they grow into men that marked the work of William Maxwell in his own boxing related novel,The Folded Leaf.

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Synecdoche, New York

Whereof we cannot speak, thereof we must be silent.

(By which I mean it's been a couple of weeks since I saw this and I'm still not sure what I can usefully say without discussing it with a few others first, so I'd like to open up the comments box to you and see if we can sort this out. At the moment all I have are a few words to get us started: performance, reality, wordplay, Beckett, meaning, self-indulgence, simulacrum, depression...)

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