Q&A 6 : goths, women, film

Anna McDuff writes:

"What are your favorite goth bands of the 1980s?"   

When I was a teenager, the UK charts were hip deep in goth bands but I didn't really like goth music. I liked dance music, and synth pop. Fields of the Nephilim were the exact opposite of the Rob & Raz featuring Leila K, the Pet Shop Boys and Erasure.

I did enjoy the pounding singles "This Corrosion" and "Dominion" by Sisters of Mercy. And who can forget "Temple of Love" featuring Ofra Haza? Not I! But the only goth band I liked, and like still, is The Cure. A boring answer. But in the rear view mirror of music, only the tallest poppy is still visible nearly forty years down the road.

"Why are you so much better at writing female characters than other male comic makers?"   

I don't know if this is true. I think the only thing I've done differently is give a lot of female characters the agency to drive stories, because I enjoyed the rare occasions that happened in the comics I read in my youth. I'm not trying to do anything special, or making conscious decisions. I just like women. I went to a boy's school from 11-18 and I think that is probably the reason I fill my comics with women, because they were so absent at the point my hormones were just screaming.

"If you could make a movie of one of your comics, which would you choose and what would it be like? Any preferred directors/actors/etc?"

I struggle to transpose my comics in my head to other media - even prose writing. I'm so tied up in the creation of a very specific art form that it's hard for me to see how it would work a different way. Animation seems an obvious jump from comics but the reader is a participant in the process of reading comics, animation removes that burden of connection and interpretation.

But every once in a while I see a film that feels like, this is what I'm trying, inexpertly, to do. This is what I'm trying to communicate. I remember Garth Jennings' Son of Rambow being a big influence on Bad Machinery. I was thinking about Bill Forsyth's Local Hero while working on Steeple, thought that may not be immediately obvious. During 2020 I watched a film called Make Up directed by Claire Oakley that caught some of the feelings I was going for, in a similar setting. It conveyed things I don't have the skill to depict.

I struggle to affix actors to my characters. Actors age, so I can't put a pin in one. Someone might have been right in 2004, but now, much less so. My readers are good at this game, I'm not -- I'm too invested! I'm always reminded of the various Just William adaptations on UK television. The Just William series may be my favourite work of literature. For TV, they'd find these great Williams, but he's always 11 years old, so there could only ever be one series.

Who would direct a good John Allison comic film? You need someone who directs screwball comedies of the 1940s. Anything starring Barbara Stanwyck. Let's say Peter Godfrey, who directed Christmas In Connecticut. Sadly he's be been dead for more than half a century. So in his absence, I'll shoot for Whit Stillman instead. Damsels In Distress is everything I aspire to. 

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