venus febriculosa

For those who love the work of the late W.G. Sebald, erudite, elegaic, steeped in melancholy and Weltschmerz,  it is not a stretch to declare his somber books sacred texts. Little wonder, then, that the prospect of a film based on The Rings of Saturn could produce in such a person anxiety bordering on panic. However, Grant Gee’s superb film, Patience (after Sebald) part documentary, part gloss, part travel diary, manages to achieve the unthinkable: an intelligent and interesting exploration of Sebald’s world. And, organically woven through the film, inseparable from it, is the extraordinary music of James Leyland Kirby or, rather, his project The Caretaker.