by Nan
Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil enthralled me. Then I saw the film on video and had the very good fortune of visiting the place which forms its fascinating backdrop.

You can thus comprehend and empathize with the enthusiasm I feel and the deep absorption that continues to haunt me and occupy my mind when it lies vacant and ready to float wherever the passing mood veers it to.

The book

John Berendt is a journalist who lived in New York and once visited Savannah. Captivated by the charm of the place, he revisited, making his visits longer each time, until he finally transplanted himself for a semi permanent stay. Thus did he acquaint himself with the characters he so vividly brings to life in his true-life novel, entering the story on a killing that took place while he was living in Savannah.

The characters who pass through his novel, referred to often as just Midnight, are exotic in one way or another; unique, full of life and drawn with sharp exactness and vividity. There’s handsome and rich Jim Williams, restorer of antique houses and furniture and avid collector of expensive objects ‘d art. By his own admission he says it is better to live an aristocratic life without actually being an aristocratic. He wears Farbege cuff links, visits Geneva and London - Christie’s and Sotheby’s, for the highest priced auctions and throws an annual Christmas party which is THE social event of Savannah. Invited to it, you are with it; rejected into his uninvited list you become a pariah of sorts until you redeem yourself in his eyes and manage to make it to a future party.

The next most exotic character is Lady Chablis, transvestite who insists she is a woman and a lady at that. The author first meets here emerging from the doctor’s after having herself injected with a hormone dose which sends her dizzy. So she asks Barendt for a lift and thus begins their friendship.

Another colourful character is the black sorceress who casts spells on people. Her technique is to visit the grave of her late husband, give the dead ‘soul’ a drink by pouring a stiff one into the ground and then guzzling some of it herself and then seeking help in casting her spells. She helps Jim Williams with occult advise and sand throwing during his trial.

Midnight ... was first published in the mid l990s and soon enough made it to the best seller lists of America Mercer House plays an important role in the story because it is here that the shooting of the young punk, kept by Jim Williams, takes place. Danny Hansford becomes more and more incorrigible, more and more demanding of money and ever more wayward. Finally, late one night, leaving a trail of wilfully destroyed antiques, he faces Jim and threatens to shoot him. His stubbing of a cigarette on Jim’s very expensive and very antique study table finally snaps Jim’s endurance. He shoots the young man and thus results the case the book details in all its ramifications, and the exposition that the wild one was sex partner to Jim, though to all intends and purposes he was hired as a nurse cum companion to see that Jim, being diabetic, was cared for when travelling. No one could be a worse nurse!

Mercer House, like many buildings in Savannah, is steeped in history. It was built in the 1860s by Hugh Weeden Mercer, the great grandfather of lyricist Johnny Mercer, on Bull Street in Monterey Square, the designer being John Morris of New York. It was damaged by Union troops at the end of the Civil War. It was bought by John Wilder in 1966 and restored. Then in 1970 Jim Williams bought it and restored it as his private residence. It is now owned by another family but has been used in many films including Midnight, Glory and Swamp Thing II.

The film

Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, directed by Clint Eastwood, was filmed on location in Savannah and stars Kevin Spacey as Jim Williams. The makeup people have done a marvellous job of enhancing the resemblance so much so that in the film you really see the suave, sophisticated, handsome Jim Williams as seen in photographs of the man. John Cusack plays the role of the young journalist who befriends the characters in the novel and gains their approval for being written about, Jim Williams included.

Cemeteries take up a fair amount of footage, specially Bonaventure Cemetery in Savannah. The "Bird Girl" statuette or tomb stone has become an icon, so famous a figure of interest after it appeared on the cover of Barendt’s book that it had to be removed from its place in the cemetery and relocated at the Telfair Museum. The family that owned the plot on which the girl stood removed it in order to preserve the dignity of the family burial plot.

The place

Was it any wonder that yours truly, enticed by the book, totally captivated by the film, was overjoyed at being offered a visit to Savannah? A long drive of nearly 300 miles and an overnight stay seemed well worth the effort and expense. The satisfaction of breathing in the air of the city of the Garden of Good and Evil was an experience not to be missed The visit was totally soul-satisfying, enthralling and just beautifully happy.

Savannah is steeped in history and the atmosphere and historicity is extremely well preserved. Walking around and seeing the many statues and reading the plaques marking this and that historical event or site absorbs your total self. You move back in time to mark the place where James Edward Oglethorpe on 12th February 1733 founded and established the Colony of Georgia, landing on the bank of the river Savannah after having set off from Britain on the ship Anne, on September 11th, 1732. Tomochici, chief of the Indian tribe Yamacrow received Oglethorpe and signed a Treaty of Friendship. Another associated with the treaty was Princess Consapnakeesa, the child of an Indian princess and British father, who was educated in Charleston. The legend on the statue of Oglethorpe says of him: "Great soldier, eminent statesman, famous philanthropist".

Savannah is also the birthplace of the founder of the girl guides movement. Her house bears a plaque with her name: Juliette Gordon Low.

The highlight of the visit and the rambling walks was of course gazing at Mercer House. We meandered through the many squares, small and well demarcated one from the other, which form the dominant feature of the sleepy city. We reached Monterey Square and there stood the pinkish walled, vegetation surrounded, two storeyed house, now a private residence but so steeped in romance, tragedy, grandeur and memories.

Savannah is characterised by its squares and its trailing parasitic Spanish moss which grows on almost all the trees in the city, flowing down languidly, emphasising the laid back nature of the town.

We saw a notice that advertised a show by Lady Chablis, now probably totally a woman. A person who had lived in Savannah told me that Lady Chablis’ shows are wildly successful, well patronized, but borders on the vulgar! She was all that appearing as herself in the film.

The reality is that everything is so well preserved, so meticulously marked. I mean, a plaque says something like "Here set foot General Ogletthorpe with his 114 men" How mark exactly a spot that is historically significant but occurred nearly three centuries ago and would probably not have been marked then. But in the name of preservation and tourism the city fathers of Savannah seem to have stretched a point or two.

Subsequent to the publication of Midnight and release of the film, Mercer House and Bonaventure Cemetery became greater magnetic attractions and crowd pullers than the historic sites of Savannah. But yet, all is eye catching and mind engaging, whether you walk, take a horse drawn carriage ride or the shuttle bus. Walking of course is the best way to sight see and imbibe the special ambience of this southern city.

The combination of the taste of the book, film and location spot was exciting, to say the least.

Our own spots

We have our own such delights: Madol Duwa and Viragaya, their films, and the lake and house in Koggala. There is also a special exhibition room dedicated to Martin Wickremasinghe in the National Library at Independence Avenue.

A stay in the Hambantota rest house will naturally take you the short distance to the Magistrate’s Court on the same hill. You gaze over the blue bay, and then, turning your head, at the green of the distant jungle, exactly as Leonard Woofe did while he heard the trumped up case against Silindu and his son-in-law Babun. So there again is the magic mix of novel, film and site.

But we do not make enough of our sites of interest. We do not have a single board to say Leonard Woolfe worked here. Even Koggala is not so attention grabbingly marked.

I hear there have been proposals to mount a sound and light display in Sigiriya What’s holding up such a tourist attraction? Sigiriya, specially on a moonlight night, would lend itself so marvellously to a retelling of the story of aesthete and patricidal King Kassyapa.

We desire the foreign exchange the tourists bring in, we build more and more hotels, but fail to attend to the little things that make all the difference.