No Maps for These Territories, a brilliant documentary on William Gibson, is out on DVD! Here's a quote from my review of the film for Wired:
The original cyberpunk, a hunched beanpole of a man, puffs cigarettes as ideas roll off his Southern tongue. Though his languorous musings are nothing like his intense and furious prose, Gibson's speaking and writing styles share a signature density. He tosses off one-liners effortlessly. Describing the "post-geographic" frisson he experiences when an ATM in Santa Monica, California, reports his Vancouver bank balance, Gibson says, "We've been growing a prosthetic extended nervous system for the last 100 years or so – and it's really, really starting to take."
Neale uses two MiniDV cameras to create restrained visuals that complement Gibson's slow brilliance. The film's defining image is of Gibson sitting in the back of the limo. Additional footage from the trip and from archives – vacant fields, the Sunset Strip, nuclear explosions – provide a sly counterpoint. Intercut with scenes from the ride are short conversations with Gibson's friends:Writers Jack Womack and Bruce Sterling discuss his work and its cultural relevance, and Bono reads from Neuromancer.
Back in the car, Gibson comes clean about the faintly embarrassing adolescent attitude that 1984's Neuromancer displayed. "It's a young man's book," he says. "I don't have access to that material now, and if I did, it'd be bad news."
I might just have to pick up a copy of this thing — it's been a year since I saw it, and I wouldn't mind having it around.
(Thanks, Joe!)
