he felt like he was in a movie already , abandoned on a lonely station platform sometime in the forties , just back from the front , etched out in monochrome , the light of stars painted and the buildings scissored from cereal packets , reversed , vague doors and windows drawn on , a token drainpipe straw , some cotton-wool , the hero a shell-shocked soldier ( say that fast ) coming to terms with his life after death , weary of adventure , propelled by a wicked uncle into the unforgiving , celluloid night .