MetteIn the cold Copenhagen spring, one event allowed me to seek refuge in the (relatively) warm cinema halls of the capital. CPH:DOX is an annual documentary film festival featuring new, challenging documentaries from all around the world. As a full-time student, I didn’t have the time to go to as many screenings as I would have liked to, but I did manage to cover a good bandwidth from “what the hell” over “yeah nice idea” to “oh my God I am forever changed”. Here’s what I saw.
[SCIENCE]
Cyborgs Among Us
In the beginning of this movie, I was sure that it was a mockumentary. We see small snippets of interviews with people who describe themselves as “cyborgs”; people that are part machine, part human. One of them has an antenna sticking out of his head, another has an implant that gives him his hearing back, while the last one has a blinking light inside his hand. Soon I realized that the hyperrealism was caused by the fact that these are real people. As the movie progresses, we meet many other people with technological implants, but keep going back to those first enigmatic three. They are a great representation of the different kinds of people who are fighting for everyone’s right to enhance the body with technology; the very artistic and eccentric antenna-man, the articulate, politically active programmer who wants to be allowed to change the software of his hearing implant, and an underground “bio-hacker”. Having never given much thought to the possibility of real cyborgs living among us, I enjoyed how this film opened my eyes to that subject. It’s beautifully filmed and passes no judgment on any of the issues and debates presented, which is what has ruined many otherwise great documentaries for me. If any of the subject matter seems ridiculous, the filmmakers are not to blame. I would recommend this if you are interested in science and technology in any way, so basically to anyone.
Inventing Tomorrow
Sometimes, all I want from a documentary is that it makes me feel good. This type of doc has been quite popular with both audiences and critics in the last years, and it’s easy to see why. It lies in the nature of documentary filmmaking to focus on the problems and conflicts of the world, so it’s great when they leave you with a feeling of hope. Inventing Tomorrow also isn’t really a film about the problems of the world, but more a film about the young people who are going to solve them. Centering around the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair (ISEF), the movie takes you on a journey around the world to meet a handful of talented teens who are working on solving the environmental issues in their homes. They all eventually get to go to ISEF to present their ideas, where many of them make it into the top three of their categories.
This is just such an inspiring and hopeful film that it’s hard not to like it. If I had seen this as a 13-year old, I might have spent my teenage years differently from what I did, so it would be a great one to show in schools. But even as an adult, it’s amazing to see what talents are hidden all around the world, and it confirms my opinion that good education is one of the biggest investments a society can make.
[NATURE]
Becoming Animal
This was the first film at the festival that I can’t say I enjoyed. It’s based on a book by bio-philosopher David Abram and mainly captures nature in the American Mid-West paired with a voice-over by Abram. I had forgotten my aversion to philosophers before I saw this film. When I took the subject in high school, I was initially quite excited, but quickly found out that to me it’s mainly empty words without meaning. And the same happened when I saw Becoming Animal. Sure, the intent behind the film is beautiful and great. I love nature and I’m all for observing, respecting and preserving it. But this film didn’t inspire any of those feelings in me. It just made me feel empty and bland, I didn’t feel like most of the frames represented the way I see nature at all. But the worst thing was definitely the voice over – I have no other word to describe my impression of it more accurately than pretentious. It seems like people really love this film so far, so maybe if you are reading this, you will too. But personally, I won’t be seeing another film about a bio-philosopher again.
Image courtesy of CPH:DOX