Tarkovsky's film tells the story of three men breaking into a mysterious sealed-off Zone in an unnamed country (presumably the USSR) and journeying to the even-more-mysterious Room at its heart – a place where, it is said, one's innermost wishes will be granted. It may be a great monument looming formidably over 20th-century cinema, but to Dyer it is also a compelling human story that has proved inexhaustibly relevant to his own life and has informed (sometimes in a spookily prophetic way) how we view the world around us. A fast reader could polish it off in less time than it would take to watch the film itself (163 minutes).ĭyer first saw Stalker in his 20s and, though 'slightly bored and unmoved' by it on that first viewing, he has returned to the film obsessively ever since. Despite operating on many layers, it's not a long book.

Zona is an intriguing proposition: Dyer writes about the film in something approaching real time, describing each scene as it happens – almost like a DVD commentary – and pausing at regular intervals to reflect on the making of Stalker, on other films and other works of art, on being Geoff Dyer, and on being Geoff Dyer writing this book about Stalker. In his new book, Geoff Dyer sets out to address this problem by articulating what he loves so much about Stalker in terms that won't alienate the casual viewer. Most other people regard them like non-mountaineers regard Everest: 'I'm sure it's a great mountain, but damned if I'm climbing it.' Cinema buffs wear their familiarity with films such as Stalker and Tarr's seven-hour Sátántangó like a badge of honour and speak of them in reverential tones.

Perhaps only the work of the Hungarian director Béla Tarr is viewed (or not, in most cases) with greater trepidation. Difficult, not just in the sense of intellectually demanding, but difficult as in hard to sit through, long and slow-moving and potentially very boring. T he films of Andrei Tarkovsky, and in particular his 1979 classic Stalker, have a reputation for being among the most difficult in cinema.

Stalker noise of the zone