by Mathew Hays

I know the sound of so I don’t mind doinginterviews,” Hanif Kureishi says,his notoriously bone-dry humourperfectly intact. The British screen-writer is keeping pace with a gruelling interview schedule at theToronto International Film Festival, where his latest, Venus, is get-ting overwhelmingly positive reviews.

The film stars British screen legend Peter O’Toole as a retired actorfacing his twilight years. When he meets the young relative of afriend, he’s totally smitten, despitethe fact that, as the old British saying goes, they have about as muchin common as chalk and cheese. Played by Jodie Whittaker, the young woman is a working-class upstart, someone more interested in MTV than Shakespeare.

But she and O’Toole are soonchums, going to the theatre together and hanging out—and O’Toole’s interest in her is far from simply platonic. It’s a funny and odd film about disparate people who are brought together and connect for the strangest reasons. And that makes it a perfect fit in the body of work of screenwriter Hanif Kureishi, an expert at depicting the contemporary culture clash

“Actually, I didn’t write the film with Peter O’Toole in mind,” says Kureishi. This proclamation seems somewhat odd, given that O’Toolefills the role so perfectly. It’s the man’s swan song—and,like his character, O’Toole is now quite frail in his late 70s. (In fact, he was supposed to come to the Toronto Fest, but cancelled, citing poor health as the reason.) “When you sitdown to write a screenplaylike this one,” Kureishiexplains, “you don’t know who’s going to be alive when you’re done. Frankly, at the age of 75, it’s a big deal for a man to take the lead role in a film.To show up every day for a full day of shooting—it’s a lot of work.

Class Act

Kureishi is clearly savouring the praise being lavished upon Venus. If racial and sexual difference have been his focus in the past, this film has him looking at issues of age and class. “She’s trash, which is why I like her, but it’s also why O’Toole likes her. You can attack white, working-class women in Britain in a way that you can’t attack blacks or gays anymore—that’s why I wanted to write about it.”

It doesn’t take long before our conversation veers away from his latest film and towards the political state of affairs. Indeed, as one might expect, the current war in Iraq weighs heavily on Kureishi.“It’s a catastrophe. I don’t think most British people wanted it either. There were no weapons of mass destruction, it was an illegal war, and it’s been a catastrophe for the Middle East and for the world at large, and we’re so much less safe now. We can only admire you Canadians for having stayed out of it.

And how times have changed: Despite ongoing problems in Britain and the West generally, many filmmakers are now making movies that reflect a much rosier, brighter picture of the immigrant experience, one in which assimilation seems attainable and an attractive option. Think Bend It Like Beckham, My Big Fat Greek Wedding, Monsoon Wedding, Bollywood/Hollywood or even Touch of Pink—in which generations learn to get along, marriage solves almost everything and xenophobia seems virtually non-existent. “There’s definitely an attempt to be more cheerful in those films,” Kureishi acknowledges. “I’m a much darker character. I think some of those films are quite influenced by Bolly-wood. And also, there’s an attempt not to show things from the community, like arranged marriages or that some people are setting fire to each other, shit like that. There’s an effort to show the community in apositive light. That’s not particularly my nature.

“It’s funny, those films, because this is a dark time. It’s dark for dif-ferent reasons than it was 20 years ago, but it’s still dark. The war, London, Syria, Iran. It’s the darkest period of my life, really. But on the other hand, we are talking about things:we’re talking about the war, about liberalism, about Bush.We live in a heavily politicized time.

Race Matters

Kureishi is also distinctly aware that recent terrorist attacks in Britain and the alleged threat of attacks in Canada has made multiculturalism as a policy a very hot political issue. “We live in a multicultural world. What arewe going to do, put a fence around every country in theworld? That’s just completely absurd. Multiculturalism isn’t just about race. We already live in a society that’s not really very integrated. I mean, the royal family doesn’t come over to my fucking house. We’ve always had segregation in Britain."

“And the talk of integration is great for the racists. What is inte-gration? That we’re all going to learn to think the same way? It’s fascistic. That’s what the war in Iraq has brought about, more of this thinking

Did the occasionally vicious threats on his security bother him? “You do worry about that kind of threat. But you carry on. I mean,you’re a writer, after all.”

Venus Opens Friday Jan. 19