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A review by mamimitanaka
Experimental Film by Gemma Files
4.0
Man, this was kind of a smorgasbord of everything I tend to like. Thorough psychological probing of one (very enjoyable) character's internal world? Check. Cosmic weirdness and ancient curses? Check. Folk tales? Check. Slow burn dread and mounting horror? Check. Engagement with art (especially avant-garde art) and the artistic process, done in good faith with obsessively detailed and enthusiastic fervor? Check!
I'll admit firsthand that film isn't really my medium - I do love a good movie here and there, but it's not really my focus as a consumer the way literature or music is, so I went into this knowing much of the terminology would likely be lost on me, and it was. But film knowledge is in no way a prerequisite for tackling this book, because our protagonist - and by extension Gemma Files - is not hesitant to inform the reader in a way that is both beneficial to the story and appropriately integrated into the character arc of Lois herself, so at the end of the day it never feels like blatant exposition. You don't have to know about film as much as you have to know about art, really, because what's really front and center here is passion for the craft, chasing down what matters to you in art - and in life in general - and staking yourself to it no matter the cost.
Everything here is illustrated perfectly through the protagonist, Lois Cairns, who acts as a medium (pardon the pun) for the novel's themes as well as a strikingly compelling character in her own right. Lois' drive is easy to empathize with - she's a down-on-her-luck film enthusiast who just wants to find meaning through creating art, something that will make the difficulties that define her life matter. When the seemingly perfect opportunity falls into her hands, she does what any of us emotionally-charged humans would do and sets out to take it. The novel does a great job of getting *deep* into her head at times, at points where some of the more vicious thoughts she had made me wonder whether I should be rooting for her or not, but if anything her brazen honesty and acknowledgment of the depth of her own shortcomings only makes her more likeable and magnetic to read. She's also got a witty, conversational tone that consistently felt like she was directly addressing the reader in a discussion, and her electric writing style (which feels just as much hers as the author herself) made it very hard for me to stop reading.
Structurally this novel takes the tried-and-true horror route: protagonist goes down esoteric rabbit hole, reckons with forces beyond human understanding, and unwittingly unleashes hell. But by giving Lois the depth and interiority she has, this often character-eschewing structure is given a wide-reaching breadth of empathetic attachment to the narrative itself. The "stupid horror protagonist digging a hole for themselves" trope is turned on its head here, because Lois is sharp, attentive, and deductive - it's not that she's dumb, she's just *human*, and why exactly do people - let alone fictional characters - need to act rationally, especially if said irrationality is engaged with for such an understandable reason as Lois? Her obsession is clearly illustrated and her motivations clearly communicated, successfully undermining the "why does she keep doing this" question that a lot of people seem to have umbrage with in the horror genre, and her obsession not only puts herself in harm's way but also places her loved ones in danger, something which she realizes and comes to grapple with. And her fixation is in service to art - the process, the analysis of it and its inherent subjectivity as well as the desire to form meaning from art, whether consumer or creator.
Using the concept of folk legend as the lens in which to frame the novel's themes was a clever one, because of how directly art and folk stories can parallel one another. Art, like folk tales, is constantly subject to necessary interpretation - these interpretations come from a concrete source text, sure, but meaning is assimilated by individuals and cultures, one that can often be radically different from what another believes or what the initial intention of the source text was, in a similar way folk stories are passed by word of mouth and eventually come into being as something entirely different from one person to the next (something this novel also engages in with its own unique take on a figure from Slavic myth). Art, just like myth, is a series of abstractions that reflects oneself back at oneself given the way that you, the reader, already view and interpret the world, with the added bonus of possibly even helping you expand that worldview all through nothing but said abstractions alone. They morph, like old and repurposed legends, into something entirely independent and individual, and for as long as any piece of art exists, this process is unstoppable, a train clacking down the tracks of time and history and shifting ever constantly as it does so.
With this in mind, how could we really judge Lois as "irrational"? Aren't we all irrational, aren't our experiences with stories and people almost always rooted in a deeply irrational, emotional place? Why not get obsessed with something you care about, as Lois does? Sure, maybe don't like, invite ancient demons into your life at the behest of an extreme passion, but also don't push away emotionality and sincerity, either, and do not abandon what drives your passion at the insistence of those people and interpretations of reality who arrogantly claim what you "should" care for. Art, any art, is made to be seen, and made to be molded into your own image. We are meant to look...so look, and dive as deep as you see fit.
"I think the tragedy is that the world never does end, ever. That it goes on & on, forcing us to go on along as well, until at last there is nothing else, nothing more. Until there is only what was, same as what is and what will be— Only the truth, which never changes. Truth not made flesh but image, for anyone to see. For a thought cannot be un-thought, anymore than the world can be un-made, & thus we can never escape the consequences of our mistakes, not without great price, & cost, & pain. Or perhaps not even then. Oh so hard & all for nothing, all of it, for you will look, no matter what. You must, it being your nature—all our natures. We always do."
I'll admit firsthand that film isn't really my medium - I do love a good movie here and there, but it's not really my focus as a consumer the way literature or music is, so I went into this knowing much of the terminology would likely be lost on me, and it was. But film knowledge is in no way a prerequisite for tackling this book, because our protagonist - and by extension Gemma Files - is not hesitant to inform the reader in a way that is both beneficial to the story and appropriately integrated into the character arc of Lois herself, so at the end of the day it never feels like blatant exposition. You don't have to know about film as much as you have to know about art, really, because what's really front and center here is passion for the craft, chasing down what matters to you in art - and in life in general - and staking yourself to it no matter the cost.
Everything here is illustrated perfectly through the protagonist, Lois Cairns, who acts as a medium (pardon the pun) for the novel's themes as well as a strikingly compelling character in her own right. Lois' drive is easy to empathize with - she's a down-on-her-luck film enthusiast who just wants to find meaning through creating art, something that will make the difficulties that define her life matter. When the seemingly perfect opportunity falls into her hands, she does what any of us emotionally-charged humans would do and sets out to take it. The novel does a great job of getting *deep* into her head at times, at points where some of the more vicious thoughts she had made me wonder whether I should be rooting for her or not, but if anything her brazen honesty and acknowledgment of the depth of her own shortcomings only makes her more likeable and magnetic to read. She's also got a witty, conversational tone that consistently felt like she was directly addressing the reader in a discussion, and her electric writing style (which feels just as much hers as the author herself) made it very hard for me to stop reading.
Structurally this novel takes the tried-and-true horror route: protagonist goes down esoteric rabbit hole, reckons with forces beyond human understanding, and unwittingly unleashes hell. But by giving Lois the depth and interiority she has, this often character-eschewing structure is given a wide-reaching breadth of empathetic attachment to the narrative itself. The "stupid horror protagonist digging a hole for themselves" trope is turned on its head here, because Lois is sharp, attentive, and deductive - it's not that she's dumb, she's just *human*, and why exactly do people - let alone fictional characters - need to act rationally, especially if said irrationality is engaged with for such an understandable reason as Lois? Her obsession is clearly illustrated and her motivations clearly communicated, successfully undermining the "why does she keep doing this" question that a lot of people seem to have umbrage with in the horror genre, and her obsession not only puts herself in harm's way but also places her loved ones in danger, something which she realizes and comes to grapple with. And her fixation is in service to art - the process, the analysis of it and its inherent subjectivity as well as the desire to form meaning from art, whether consumer or creator.
Using the concept of folk legend as the lens in which to frame the novel's themes was a clever one, because of how directly art and folk stories can parallel one another. Art, like folk tales, is constantly subject to necessary interpretation - these interpretations come from a concrete source text, sure, but meaning is assimilated by individuals and cultures, one that can often be radically different from what another believes or what the initial intention of the source text was, in a similar way folk stories are passed by word of mouth and eventually come into being as something entirely different from one person to the next (something this novel also engages in with its own unique take on a figure from Slavic myth). Art, just like myth, is a series of abstractions that reflects oneself back at oneself given the way that you, the reader, already view and interpret the world, with the added bonus of possibly even helping you expand that worldview all through nothing but said abstractions alone. They morph, like old and repurposed legends, into something entirely independent and individual, and for as long as any piece of art exists, this process is unstoppable, a train clacking down the tracks of time and history and shifting ever constantly as it does so.
With this in mind, how could we really judge Lois as "irrational"? Aren't we all irrational, aren't our experiences with stories and people almost always rooted in a deeply irrational, emotional place? Why not get obsessed with something you care about, as Lois does? Sure, maybe don't like, invite ancient demons into your life at the behest of an extreme passion, but also don't push away emotionality and sincerity, either, and do not abandon what drives your passion at the insistence of those people and interpretations of reality who arrogantly claim what you "should" care for. Art, any art, is made to be seen, and made to be molded into your own image. We are meant to look...so look, and dive as deep as you see fit.
"I think the tragedy is that the world never does end, ever. That it goes on & on, forcing us to go on along as well, until at last there is nothing else, nothing more. Until there is only what was, same as what is and what will be— Only the truth, which never changes. Truth not made flesh but image, for anyone to see. For a thought cannot be un-thought, anymore than the world can be un-made, & thus we can never escape the consequences of our mistakes, not without great price, & cost, & pain. Or perhaps not even then. Oh so hard & all for nothing, all of it, for you will look, no matter what. You must, it being your nature—all our natures. We always do."