Time past invades time present

Hot Milk
Director: Rebecca Lenkiewicz

Much though I enjoy writer Deborah Levy’s wit and love of language, I occasionally find the – as it has been described – “elsewhereness” of her fiction baffling, with sentences that seem heavy with import yet oddly vacant of meaning. So I approached a film version of her Man Booker shortlisted novel Hot Milk (pictured Emma Mackey and Vicky Krieps) with trepidation. However, playwright and first-time feature director Rebecca Lenkiewicz has written a screenplay “based on” rather than “adapted from” the book – bringing clarity and new narrative elements that focus the story while the setting, cinematography and musical score retain the floating intensity of Levy’s prose.

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