The Bookseller of Kabul

I casually picked this book off the bookshelf, and found the first chapter timeless and charming.  It could have happened almost anywhere in the world at any time in history. The second chapter by contrast is brutal, and fixed in place and time. Kabul under the Taliban.
Most of the book takes place after the Taliban have left, and life gets back to a rather bleak shadow of better times that can still be remembered. The bookseller can get back to openly selling all the books that were banned during the Taliban, books that told of the county's ancient history the Taliban soldiers neither knew nor cared about.  He was proud of that history and prepared to suffer to preserve its memory.
The story is not so much about the bookseller, as of his family. The individual stories of different members of the family are told from their point of view.   We see a wedding, a pilgrimage to another part of Afghanistan, a neighbourhood chat, a trip the school, younger members of the family running smaller shops and kiosks, the womenfolk visiting the public baths, and brushes with officialdom and police.  On the way we pick up an idea about Afghan customs and values.
As you would expect, there is quite bit about what life is like for women in an traditional Islamic society, recently reinforced by the Taliban. But there is a young man and young lad in the family as well, and their stories, and the pressures they are under get told as well.
The bookseller himself becomes a rather remote figure, with a strong influence over every aspect of the family members lives, even when he is not there. The more heroic figure he cuts in the second chapter seems to have been forgotten.
This was apparently the experience of the author Asne Seierstad. For this is not a novel, as I thought when I read it. This journalist was so impressed by the book seller that she arranged to stay with the family to learn more about Afghan culture. I don't suppose it is a factual account either, but it does give a flavour of a family and society struggling to recover during a bleak period of their history.  It is also a good read, if somewhat bleak at points.

Melancholia

Kirsten Dunst gives a great performance in this film as Justine, who is suffering from depression, or melancholia.  It is a shock to see the face that was so animated as Mary Jane in Spiderman looking so expressionless.
But the film is more than about depression, as Melancholia is also the name of a planet, several times bigger than earth on an erratic orbit that swings close to earth. When scientists disagree as to whether the planet will swing close to earth "Fly by" or swing back and crash into earth, "Dance of Death" it has the ingredients of a disaster movie. But it is not that kind of movie and the Kiefer Sutherland character is no Jack Bauer.
All the action takes place at the rather grand home where Claire, played by Charlotte Gainsbourg, lives with her husband and son. They put on a great party for her sister Justine on her wedding day, and become increasingly embarrassed by her erratic behaviour. The opening scene sees the newly weds arriving late when their limousine is too long for the tight bend in the driveway.
To be fair to the bride, her father, mother and father in law, who is also her employer, would have been embarrassing enough even if her behaviour had been exemplary.  If you feel for Claire's embarrasment, it is excruciating, if you just enjoy a dysfunctional party, it is great.
After the party, it is just the two sisters, and Claire's husband and son, and the two horses. The first half was entitled "Part One:Justine" and this is entitled "Part Two:Claire" I am not sure why, they all have different responses to the impending doom, and that includes the horses. Perhaps Justine's is the most sane after all.
We know the end from the beginning. There is a superb opening sequence, comprising a series of still pictures or very slow moving video, set to beautiful music from Wagner (I think).  The images are bewildering or disturbing, but find their meaning as the film develops.