0890 – Origin: Spirits of the Past (2006)

It is 300 years into the future. Earth’s environment had been devastated by mankind’s own foolish plans and humankind is beleaguered by the sentient forests which they have awoken. The world balance is tipped when a young boy named Agito stumbles across a machine that glowed in a strange blue hue inside a forbidden sanctuary. The machine, which has preserved a beautiful girl named Toola from the past, is activated. Toola has a “mission” that had been entrusted to her by the past …

Origin: Spirits of the Past, known in Japan as Silver-Haired Agito (Japanese: 銀色の髪のアギト Hepburn: Gin’iro no Kami no Agito), is a 2006 Japanese animated science fiction film directed by Keiichi Sugiyama, written by Nana Shiina and Naoko Kakimoto, and produced by Gonzo. (wiki)

imdb

0848 – New Dark Age: Technology and the End of the Future by James Bridle (2018 book)

As the world around us increases in technological complexity, our understanding of it diminishes. Underlying this trend is a single idea: the belief that our existence is understandable through computation, and more data is enough to help us build a better world.
In reality, we are lost in a sea of information, increasingly divided by fundamentalism, simplistic narratives, conspiracy theories, and post-factual politics. Meanwhile, those in power use our lack of understanding to further their own interests. Despite the apparent accessibility of information, we’re living in a new Dark Age.

From rogue financial systems to shopping algorithms, from artificial intelligence to state secrecy, we no longer understand how our world is governed or presented to us. The media is filled with unverifiable speculation, much of it generated by anonymous software, while companies dominate their employees through surveillance and the threat of automation.
In his brilliant new work, leading artist and writer James Bridle surveys the history of art, technology, and information systems, and reveals the dark clouds that gather over our dreams of the digital sublime. (VERSO)

James Bridle on New Dark Age: Technology and the End of the Future

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man always makes it clear to himself: “You are using things which have the intention of not being penetrable.” 1180

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“(…) perhaps the crash will look like a string of blockbuster movies pandering to right-wing conspiracies and survivalist fantasies, from quasi-fascist superheroes (Captain America and the Batman series) to justifications of torture and assassination (Zero Dark Thirty, American Sniper). In Hollywood, studios run their scripts through the neural networks of a company called Epagogix, a system trained on the unstated preferences of millions of moviegoers developed over decades in order to predict which lines will push the right – meaning the most lucrative – emotional buttons.  Their algorithmic engines are enhanced with data from Netflix, Hulu, YouTube and others, whose access to the minute-by-minute preferences of millions of video watchers, combined with an obsessive focus on the acquisition and segmentation of data, provides them with a level of cognitive insight undreamed of by previous regimes. Feeding directly upon the frazzled, binge-watching desires of news-saturated consumers, the network turns upon itself, reflecting, reinforcing and heightening the paranoia inherent in the system.
Game developers enter endless cycles of updates and in-app purchases directed by A/B testing interfaces and real-time monitoring of players’ behaviours until they have such a finegrained grasp on dopamine-producing neural pathways that teenagers die of exhaustion in front of their computers, unable to tear themselves away.  Entire cultural industries become feedback loops for an increasingly dominant narrative of fear and violence.”

New Dark Age: Technology and the End of the Future

James Bridle (https://jamesbridle.com/)

0825 – The Forgotten Space (2010)

timespace coordinates: 2000’s Netherlands / United States / Belgium / China / Spain

The Forgotten Space (Allan Sekula & Noël Burch, 2010) follows container cargo aboard ships, barges, trains and trucks, listening to workers, engineers, planners, politicians, and those marginalized by the global transport system. We visit displaced farmers and villagers in Holland and Belgium, underpaid truck drivers in Los Angeles, seafarers aboard mega-ships shuttling between Asia and Europe, and factory workers in China, whose low wages are the fragile key to the whole puzzle. And in Bilbao, we discover the most sophisticated expression of the belief that the maritime economy, and the sea itself, is somehow obsolete.

A range of materials is used: descriptive documentary, interviews, archive stills and footage, clips from old movies. The result is an essayistic, visual documentary about one of the most important processes that affects us today. The Forgotten Space is based on Sekula’s Fish Story, seeking to understand and describe the contemporary maritime world in relation to the complex symbolic legacy of the sea.

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The sea is forgotten until disaster strikes. But perhaps the biggest seagoing disaster is the global supply chain, which – maybe in a more fundamental way than financial speculation – leads the world economy to the abyss. (http://www.theforgottenspace.net/)

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812 – I Think We’re Alone Now (2018)

I Think We’re Alone Now is a 2018 American science fiction drama film, directed by Reed Morano and written by Mike Makowsky. It stars Peter Dinklage and Elle Fanning as two survivors of a worldwide epidemic that wipes out earth’s population. (wiki)

imdb

0780 – First Reformed (2017)

timespace coordinates: 2017 Snowbridge, New York

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“how often we ask for genuine experience when all we really want is emotion.”

First Reformed is a 2017 American drama film written and directed by Paul Schrader. It stars Ethan Hawke, Amanda Seyfried, and Cedric the Entertainer, and follows a Protestant minister faced with questions of faith and morality while serving as pastor of a dwindling historical church. (wiki)

imdb / rt

760 – Detention (2011)

timespace coordinates:  2011 – 1992 California

An apocalyptic fantasy, horror, science fiction, action- thriller, body swapping, time-traveling teen romantic comedy starring Josh Hutcherson, Dane Cook, Shanley Caswell and  Spencer Locke. Detention follows the local students of Grizzly Lake as they survive their final year of high school. Bringing even more angst to student life, a slasher killer has chosen their high school as his new home of slaughter. It becomes a race against time to stop the killer, which will in turn save the world – if only they can get out of detention. (rt)

“Insane, Hyperkinetic, Next Level Filmmaking.”

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“(…) for pop-culture pilgrims intent on discovering an underground prize, look no further.”

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“Smart, funny, and equally full of splatstick violence and heart, Detention isn’t just next-level horror–it’s next level everything, a senses-altering reaffirmation of cinema.“

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“a shockingly meaningful, potent film about the nature of meaninglessness and its damning effects on the younger generation”

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“manic throwback horror comedy for the Twitter generation.”

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“time traveling teen pop culture comedy Detention is a runaway freight train of frenetic energy!”

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“is Scream meets Scott Pilgrim with a dash or two of Kaboom, it makes for one wild cocktail.”

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Post-irony

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imdb