Children of Paradise by Camilla Grudova

 

Children of Paradise

by Camilla Grudova

The Paradise is an ancient cinema, now well past its prime, situated in an unnamed city in an unnamed country:

It was built on the ground floor of a block of flats around the time of the outbreak of the First World War, its entrance like the building’s gaping mouth, a sparkling marquee teeth grin with the word PARADISE written in pale yellow neon.

The cinema is also built over a sewer and drainage overflows into the hall at strategic points in the book.  It exudes a sense of filth and grime.

On a whim, the narrator, Holly, joins the underpaid staff of the Paradise and is slowly accepted into their coterie, made up of eccentric movie-loving misfits. The staff spend long hours at the Paradise.  Days and nights passed in the cinema are followed by binge-watching of classic and art films at their respective dingy apartments.  Despite the fact that the Paradise is dilapidated and their working conditions far from great, these eccentrics feel an intimate connection to the dirty old building, to the point that Helen occasionally has (drug-fuelled?) “time-slip” experiences haunted by visions the cinema’s past.   When the owner of the Paradise dies, the cinema is taken over by a chain, leading to an outbreak of bloody violence.

This is novel best appreciated by cinema buffs. Its title is a tribute to Marcel Carné’s Les Enfants du Paradis, and each of the chapters is named after a different classic movie, which creates interesting parallels and counterpoints with the facts described in the respective chapters.  Grudova draws on her love for the cinema and her experiences working as an usherette at the Cameo in Edinburgh after moving there from her native Canada.   I’ve read elsewhere that Iris, the cinema owner, is based on a real character.

There is also a magical feel to the novel – which gets darker and darker, moving into Gothic and horror territory.  The final chapters, an angry indictment of capitalism and gentrification, reminded me of other socially conscious contemporary novels, such as Fiona Mozley’s Hot Stew.

There is, in other words, much to admire and dig into here, but I must admit that the novel was not for me.  The pervasive sense of oppressive filth and decay (rather than “decadence” in the Romantic fin-de-siecle sense of the word) wore me down, and I found the novel’s obsession with bodily fluids, secretions and excretions gross and off-putting.  Considering the nightmarish aspects and atmosphere of the Paradise, (let alone its working conditions) I found it hard to understand the staff’s connection with it and why they would take its takeover so much to heart. 

Children of Paradise is receiving rave reviews and I can understand why, but unfortunately, I cannot bring myself to join the chorus of acclaim.     

Hardcover, 200 pages

Published July 7th 2022 by Atlantic Books