The Null Device

I went to see He Died With A Felafel In His Hand tonight (well, most of it; I missed the first 10 or so minutes of it). It was pretty good; there were quite a few similarities with Lowenstein's previous opus Dogs In Space (such as the interstitial titles, the neo-pagan burning of things and the sharehouse motif), though this was done on a bigger budget. The story isn't directly taken from the book (which is a collection of anecdotes with very few recurring characters), but rather made from the anecdotes, with multiple characters often amalgamated for the sake of coherency, though it keeps to the spirit.

The music was pretty well chosen too; two versions of Nick Cave's The Mercy Seat (during a thunderstorm, no less), and an electronica remake of the Dr Who theme, and all of two Paradise Motel songs (their blandly approachable Cars cover and, not listed in the credits nor on the CD, German Girl, from their excellent first EP). One gets the feeling that Lowenstein is a bit of a Nick Cave fan; Dogs In Space has a Boys Next Door song (Shivers), and then there's this film, not to mention Noah Taylor looking rather like Cave in places in the film (such as on the promotional material).

Now if there's any justice in the world, someone will rerelease Dogs In Space on DVD to cash in on Felafel. (There was a UK DVD release, apparently, but the transfer is said to be appallingly bad.) The soundtrack, with all that early-80s Melbourne postpunk, would also be good.

There are no comments yet on ""