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First, the Recap:
To perpetuate something is to extend indefinitely its lifespan or its process, making said thing virtually immortal. It goes without saying that we as the human race make every attempt to discover new means by which to allow our species to maintain its hold on the Earth, to be dominant force, and to hold on to legacies left to us while forming new ones for the generations to come. Yet, do we not, in this quest for sustained relevance, end up potentially on the receiving end of being supplanted by that which we’ve created, which will then instead become the new paradigm of preservation, watching it end up memorializing us in order to gain its own eternalization? Would this not seem especially true if seen through the eyes of someone, or something, foreign, not even of this world perhaps, trying desperately to carry on when facing the ramifications of progress?
Next, my Mind:
It’s a beautifully inspired, eloquently presented, and perceptively adept portrayal of humanity’s price paid for the sake of advancement and the subsequent consequences it can have only viewed through a wonderfully animated, science fiction-ized lens thanks to writer/director Stephan Larson’s four and a half minute short shown at the 2nd Annual 2019 Berlin Illambra Experimental Film Festival housed at Salon AM Moritzplatz and hosted by Illambra. The statements being made about the state of being we find ourselves in when it comes to technology and the seemingly unstoppable mechanism of industry, how it both acts as a blatant foil, causing so much negative impact to the planet, while also being an open floodgate for life enhancement in the ways our expanding knowledge and means to create tech aid in furthering society’s prosperity, health, and overall lifestyle.
What makes this thematic journey overtly original here, though, is how Larson has chosen to depict this technological dichotomy by illustrating the birth of a uniquely new form of being in a harsh, desert-like, alien environment, a portrait of nature finding its way to create where most would say no life could exist. The exquisitely lucid 3D animation here defines these entities with such powerfully emotive intensity, as the viewer watches in awe as these two creatures rise from the barrenness around them to generate and produce a gorgeously colorful and purposeful union that calls to the very heart of a species longing to survive and finding the means to do so. The progression of this manifestation is almost spellbinding in its magnificence until the film’s rather abrupt and inwardly jarring finale arrives that drives home Larson’s ultimate points when it comes to our development.
It’s a sobering picture to take in when we apply it to the realities of what our modern world faces along these lines, and the utilization of these concepts being portrayed on an alien world actually might speak just as strongly about the fact that if we were to literally begin colonizing on other worlds, would this end up being the results? This critic honestly enjoys messages like this only in that at minimum, it should be cause for us to think more about exactly how we see technology’s breakthroughs and the reliance we place upon it, maybe needing to realize a little more that some is good, but too much could end up being our, or something else’s, destruction. Is it worth that high a price for what mainly boils down to simple convenience? Does this not then speak to our own impatience or laziness?
There’s a bit of ironic humor with this project in that for all its suppositions and biting stabs at both the pros and cons of technology, the film itself was created with a major form of ever-developing tech–computer animation. So it comes down to having to acknowledge that for all the perseverance the natural world around us exhibits, we as people likewise exhibit the ways to consistently crush it, “and so my quandary remains” as Larson himself states. Hence in total, “Perpetuate”, with its sublimely captivating visual presentation paired with unflinching notions about our relationship to the place we call home and the influences we’re having for good or ill upon it, is a excellently executed short film with a conscious that ideally will leave lasting impressions on the viewer and maybe, just maybe, make us take a second look at how we might curb certain advances before we crush all that is actually worth immortalizing.
As always, this is all for your consideration and comment. Until next time, thank you for reading!
