2 hours ago
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Castaway stories, from Cast Away to The Martian, often make for feelgood classics. They are tales about an ingenious individual overcoming huge odds, a triumphant metaphor for the human spirit. Here’s a funny thing: castaway stories featuring large groups of people lead to the exact opposite. Forced to self-organise, they end up eating each other. The exception is Lost; I don’t know what that was about. Polar bears?
Needless to say, I like them all. So it’s exciting to see a new kid on the block – or rather an old boy. William Golding’s novel Lord of the Flies, about a group of British schoolboys who crash-land on a desert island, has been part of the UK curriculum for more than 60 years. I wonder if we forget the books we’re forced to study, and are obliged to rediscover them in later life. I know this story well, but am not sure I can say I fully experienced it until this striking new BBC version (Sunday, 9pm, BBC One).
Promisingly, it’s adapted by Jack Thorne. Every time a new Jack Thorne drama appears, which is no more than a couple of times a month, my writer friends wonder at his prodigious talent. Why does this man write as if he’s running out of time? As if he’s found himself in possession of the last pen on Earth? Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, This Is England, Toxic Town, His Dark Materials, The Swimmers, The Virtues and The Motive and the Cue. You saw Adolescence. Did this man put his fingers in a socket doing DIY, and now electricity pours out of them?
Lord of the Flies draws Thorne back to the theme of developing masculinity, with a 1950s spin. Except here’s the thing about desert islands: they stay the same. Without clothes, you lose another marker of time. Aside from wireless hiss over the opening credits, and the occasional use of period language from the book, nothing about this four-parter doesn’t feel contemporary, and painfully so. Think of it as Adolescence: Origins.
The mini-series is directed by Bafta-laden film-maker Marc Munden, and from the first episode it takes no prisoners. Televisually, it unmoors the audience from familiar comforts as much as the stranded boys. Dialogue is sparse, shots held for a long time, the fourth wall frequently broken. This happens through repeated closeup portraits of the boys’ faces. They gaze back at us, upward into the lens, expressing – what? Vulnerability? Aggression? The ambiguity is telling.
The boys are a diverse group, which isn’t to say there isn’t class analysis, too. The entrance of a troupe of Canterbury cap-clad choristers, processing up a white sand beach to the strains of a religious chant, is an extraordinary, mirage-like image. Posh, confident, reeking of skiing holidays, they are led by the entitled Jack. Having lost the initial leadership election to the more responsible Ralph, Jack decides his followers will be the hunters, a group unto themselves.
“I hope no adults come for a week, so we get to have some fun!” crows Jack, played by cherubic newcomer Lox Pratt, who I really hope is as nice in real life. I’ll steer clear of spoilers (although the novel was written in 1954, and has been pumped into kids more often than brown asthma inhalers). Let’s just say we all have different ideas of fun. Some of us like Wordle and banana bread. Others like setting things on fire. The latter tends to have more of an impact on everyone else.
It’s almost comical how quickly everything is on fire. “Toilets, water, hut-building, boring!” complains Jack, who wants leadership without guardrails. He could be wearing a “Make Desert Island Great Again” cap; he’s actually wearing a face shroud made of garments salvaged from a dead woman’s suitcase. Is this a story about politics or toxic masculinity? They are one and the same, is the bleak suggestion. The show is excellent, a Joseph Conrad-esque fever, with moments of surreal horror. I felt sick watching it, though. I’ve never been more grateful to live under the rule of law, that ultimate dweeb’s charter.
Jack Thorne’s output remains unequalled. Surely he must need a break from this material, to go on holiday or something. Can anyone recommend a quiet beach?
