Diary of a film

In this atmospheric if slightly mannered novel from Govinden (This Brutal House), a Zagreb filmmaker roams an Italian city in the lead-up to the festival premiere of his latest film. The unnamed "maestro" meets a woman, Cosima, strolls through the city with her, visits the murals her boyfriend had painted in the 1980s before dying by suicide, and reads her novel, which he hopes to adapt for his next project. As the visit draws to a close, her hesitation to cede the rights--rooted in her objection to his directorial vision--provides a sliver of drama. Govinden shines in scenes involving the filmmaker observing his two young stars as they negotiate their growing fame, tenuous new romance with each other, and sense of melancholy that they won't be able to recapture their magical intimacy on future projects. There are some lovely paeans to a fading film world: "This is what cinema is: the noise, torn sprockets patched together; the heat and smell of burning from the machine." Too often, though, characters have a stage-ready monologue or affected declaration at the ready: "If you are a flâneur, maestro, then I'm a flâneuse.... Walking is what gives me life, and what stimulates my ideas," says Cosima. Nonetheless, readers can't help being seduced by the protagonist's commitment to a life of art. (May)

Jangly nerves, obsessive ruminations, and a chance encounter lead a renowned film director toward unsettling developments and an unexpected epiphany. This taut, allusive, and illuminating novel explores creativity and receptivity--the processes through which we make art and experience it. The unnamed narrator is a throwback auteur, one of the last who still shoots on film and protects the integrity of his vision against marketplace pressures and outside influence. With affection and respect, he is called "maestro" by all, including his cast and his longtime production collaborators. The novel concerns his return to an Italian film festival with his highly anticipated adaptation of William Maxwell's novel The Folded Leaf. Among those joining him are actors Lorien and Tom, whom he generally calls "the boys" and whose careers will likely receive huge boosts from the reception the film is expected to receive. Yet the director is all jitters, unsure of that reception and of what he will do next. He takes refuge in an espresso bar, where he encounters a woman who recognizes him and who proceeds to tell (and show) him a story that will pervade the novel and, he eventually comes to hope, become his next film. With psychological acuity, the novel shows the subtle changes in their relationship, in his relationship with his two main actors (who have fallen in love after their roles in his movie brought them together), and in his love for and dependence on his husband and their young son, who remain at home while he is at the festival but are very much present in his mind. The result is a novel about a film, about a filmmaker who has adapted a novel, and about a piece of visual art and the tragic story behind it that the filmmaker fixates upon as his next project. A slow fuse leads to a climactic flashpoint, putting all sorts of notions about life and art into fresh perspective. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.