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Making drastic changes to a novel while adapting it for the screen is one thing, but doing so when the novelist is a close friend can induce new levels of anxiety. Scottish director David Mackenzie found himself in that situation when he decided to tackle Peter Jinks's acclaimed Hallam Foe, an offbeat story about a young Peeping Tom's decidedly odd journey to self-knowledge. Mackenzie and Jinks had known each other since sharing "a lovely big party flat" in Edinburgh many years ago; since then, the former had gained notoriety for 2003's Young Adam, itself an (impressively faithful) adaptation of Alexander Trocchi's cult 1954 novella, and the latter had become a novelist of some repute. "Peter's...
