The Falls

Greenaway's fantasy expands enormously the same obsessions as his earlier A Walk Through H and Vertical Features Remake: a cross between Alice after the Holocaust and the ramblings of a deranged film librarian. Set in a strangely serene future - after a Violent Unexplained Event which has irrevocably changed Life as We Know It - The Falls sets out to document the biographies of 92 victims of the event, all selected on the basis that their names begin with the letters 'Fall'. The strategy is ingenious, substituting an amazing excess of 'content' for the formalism that has (usually) defined the avant-garde. Not recommended to people who like one story, two characters, and a happy ending. But for those who like riddles, acrostics, sudden excursions, romantic insights, and the eerie music of Michael Nyman (plus bits of Brian Eno)...come to Xanadu.