Night Film is suspenseful, obsessive and quirky read up to a point. The story revolves around Investigative reporter Scott McGrath and his obsession with film director Stanislas Cordova. McGrath was disgraced earlier in his career when he got a tip from a source that Cordova was a pedophile and is convinced that the tip was a set up by Cordova who is a master manipulator. Cordova comes off as a director that is a combination of Hitchcock, Kubrick and Oliver Stone with a lot of J.D. Salinger’s reclusiveness. He produces dark, disturbing films that are cult favorites that are shown in underground venues including underneath the subway system in Paris. When Cardova’s daughter Ashley is found is an old broken down building in NY and her death is ruled a suicide, McGrath sees this as his way of vindicating himself and his reputation. The first 200 pages or so is exciting page turning material that combines excerpts from magazine and newspaper clippings, blog entries and McGrath’s old case file notes along with the narrative for a fast paced and unique read. It is like the reader is inside the reporter’s world and sees inside his mind and how he unravels the story before it unravels him. Along the way he encounters Nora and Hooper, two people who have their own connection to Ashley who help him unearth more pieces to the puzzle. But to be successful McGrath has to be in some ways inside of Cordova’s head and that proves a dangerous place to be. In Cordova’s world Sovereign, Deadly, and Perfect are mentioned—“Sovereign: the sanctity of the individual, regarding yourself as princely, powerful, self-contained, wresting authority for yourself away from society. Deadly: constant awareness that your death is inevitable, which means there is no reason not to be ferocious now, about your life. Perfect: the understanding that life and whatever you find yourself at the present are absolutely ideal”.
Cordova’s films delve into the darkest underbelly and reflected images within shadows and at the edge of reality. McGrath has suspicions that many of the stars who appeared in a Cordova film witnessed actual murders while on location and that most of them faded into black soon after the release. One harrowing tale from the book is that Cordova’s son Theo had a horrible accident (three fingers accidentally cut off) that took place during the shooting on one film and Cordova made him part of a scene and go through numerous cuts rather than taking him to a hospital. Ashley also appears in one of his films, but eventually finds her own creative abilities when she takes up the piano and becomes a protégé. What would cause a girl so young and with so much potential to commit suicide. Why was she seen days before her death at various places tracking down some people and sending a package to Hooper just before her untimely death? The story seems so juicy until it jumps the shark when Ashley crosses over a bridge. It is then the story warps into one filled with black magic and references to the devil. The book is kind of like going to the boardwalk to have fun on a few rides and ending up by mistake in the Hall of Mirrors. That is not to say the book is not fun. Pessl surely has talent and moves the story along and creates characters that are memorable, caring, dogged, law-breaking, elusive, illusions and enigmas. What is hard to tell at the end is what is real and what is made up.
