G W Pabst was a brilliant Austrian film director in the early to mid-20th century. This is the fictionalised story of his career during Germany’s annexation of his home country, his eventual capitulation to work with the Nazi propaganda arm in World War II, and the making and losing of his purported best film at the end of the war.

In the late 1930s Pabst was lured to Hollywood. His one film, made against his better judgement, bombed at the box office. After receiving a telegram from his ailing mother, he returned to Austria to leave with her. But the Reich had other plans for him. Pabst was an auteur, used to having total control over filming. To achieve anything now, however, compromises had to be made. Kehlmann settles on ambiguity when relating the level of Pabst’s cooperation.

The Director‘s sensibility is cinematic. The universal rule for writing scenes on screen is to come into the action late and leave it early. This is evident from the beginning, and it makes comprehension difficult. It’s further confused by the narration from different characters’ perspectives (who often aren’t the major focus of the narrative). The reader is never quite able to get comfortable. This is deliberate and very, very clever. The unsettling prospect of war and authoritarianism facing the novel’s characters is experienced vicariously by the reader. At times this reads like Orwell; at others it has the absurdity of Kafka … but always it has the brilliance of Kehlmann.

Reviewed by Bob Moore

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