My recent interview with acclaimed writer Stephen Volk has just been published in the latest edition of The Irish Journal of Gothic and Horror Studies. The interview covers the range of Volk's work and seeks to make sustained connections throughout these various films and television programmes as well as looking at the traces and evidences of the Gothic within them. Alongisde the interview is a review of Volk's latest film The Awakening. Extracts from both below...
Stephen Volk Interview
Rose: Ghosts dominate your work, Ghostwatch, Afterlife and The Awakening all being obvious examples. What is the appeal of ghosts for you?
Volk: The
ghost is a device, essentially. One that enables you to discuss the
theme of its fundamental nature, i.e death. For me, a ghost is a prism
through which to explore certain ideas in a more vivid way, I think,
than, say, a social realist drama ever could.
I
think also the beauty of ghosts is that they are a very easy way for
the audience to get the idea that the uncanny or unreal has entered the
realm of the normal. No further explanation is needed. A more complex
supernatural phenomenon (vampires, zombies, aliens) needs a setting up
of rules and so on: whereas I think the person in the street has an
inbuilt knowledge of what a so-called “ghost” is and how that is
expected to work. Which you can conform to or confound, as you wish.
Rose:
Do the ghosts that manifest themselves within your work function on a
metaphoric level? Do they represent something other than an image of the
deceased?
Volk:
My approach is very much that the character who sees the ghost is the
important thing, not so much the ghost itself. The ghost is there,
symbolically, often, to represent or “amp-up” a fatal flaw in the
character who sees it, or (in the case of Robert Bridge in Afterlife)
to make tangible, or at least bring into focus, an unhealed
psychological wound. This is a bit different from the traditional,
folkloric idea of a ghost being there to bring a secret crime to justice
(as in The Ring), but of course both can occur in the same story, and there are plenty of secrets and crimes in Afterlife too.
The Awakening Review
The Awakening was
written by acclaimed writer Stephen Volk and then reworked by director
Nick Murphy. While this indicates a distillation of Volk’s authorial
stamp, perhaps a more productive way of reviewing The Awakening is
to consider it as a wider part of his growing body of work. Throughout
his film, television, theatrical and fictional works, Volk has centred
his narratives upon strong female characters and has often returned to
the scene of the séance and the two fundamental characters that are
implicit in that scenario, the clairvoyant/believer and the sceptic.
While it is obvious to state that The Awakening
clearly connects with these recurrent motifs, the séance sequence works
more to establish Cathcart as a character through her beliefs and her
methodology: she is presented as a strong woman, one who is clearly
committed to the debunking of the supernatural through an understanding
of the charlatan’s trickery and deceitful methods. Her strength and
authority is further emphasised when the arresting detective tries
tactfully to ask her not to order him into action in front of the
constables. Yet this is all counter-balanced by the item she brings to
the séance – a photograph of a soldier. When asked by the exposed medium
if the man in the picture is indeed dead she doesn’t answer him
directly but instead states that “This grotesque charade won’t bring him
back.” Her response intimates an acceptance of her loss but, as the
narrative progresses, it becomes blatantly apparent that she has not
come to terms with it. Whether this loss motivates Cathcart into
debunking séances is left ambiguous but perhaps, instead, motivates her
to find a truth, as opposed to a deception, in Spiritualism.
Both the interview and review can be read by following this link.
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