Wednesday 26 November 2014

William Gibson Keynote Talk at BFI Southbank - UPDATED


We were told not to take pics as this would be up online as video at the BFI website - but I can't find it.*



Of Tron : WG said it was the first most exciting representation of interacting with events in the cyber environment he's ever seen. Typing he believes is not exciting or dynamic and he avoids mention of it throughout Neuromancer.

On Pattern Recognition he said the Buzz Rickson jacket in black didn't exist until the book was published - then the clothing company asked him if they could produce a version!

On dystopias he said they are perhaps too much a thing of the moment, and the world of Neuromancer is no more dystopian than this one if you are in the wrong part of the world.

He gets a lot of inspiration from the bitter wit of Steeley Dan lyrics.

One book that he thinks that needs to be a movie - Them Bones by Howard Waldrop

He dropped several hints that he and Ridley Scott has discussed a movie version of Joe Haleman's (absolute classic) Forever War but interviewer ignored  them all to ask the same boring questions about Blade Runner we've been hearing for the last 30 years.

WG's own dramatic highlight was his X-Files episode, The Kill Switch

And finally, in response to an audience question, he wondered if the future of novel writing was writing for an audio book audience.

I'm currently listening to Difference Engine.




*I'm not generall impressed by the BFI at present, the £45 I spent on a years membership got me a staggering £1.50 off an £80 booking fee last week, and the film print they showed last night (of Robert Zemekis's Contact) was the worst I've seen since the Scala Cinema club days