sSince the dawn of the 20th century and the spread of existential thinking, each generation has feared that it is at the end of history, witnessing the hysterical collapse of the social and political order. From the postwar era of nuclear anxiety to the sweet counterculture summers to the turn of the millennium, some factions are always afraid to be forced to leave the world they understand to make way for a new and frightening and confusing one. I would say that the current generation of humans alive on Earth – having dealt with a global pandemic last year, incompetent attempts at fascist conquests, the fracture and fragmentation of the world economy and, in some regions, the sky bursting into flames – a further claim legitimate to that feeling than any that has come before.
If the last days of the year and its promise to launch a vaccine bring a taste of hope, the predominant note of 2020 was a sour apocalyptic smell. The despair, boredom, frustration and surreal delusion that defined the past 12 months were largely articulated in writing last year; today, we look to the future. Even with real life having assumed the destructive maximalism of a Roland Emmerich film, we can still turn to films set in the year 2021 in search of perspectives on what previous generations imagined would await us. And from these views, whether dystopian or utopian, perhaps we can begin to prepare for a year that cannot be worse than this one. Continue reading for a survey of cinematic divinations about the possible dangers that await in the days to come:
Carnage
Simon Amstell’s mockumentary on the BBC presents an entire chronology that stretches from World War II to 2067, an ambitious account that details how tomorrow’s UK will abandon meat and adopt a totally vegan lifestyle. The year 2021 figures prominently in this timeline, as the point at which a super swine flu hits Britain to claim a large body count. The number of head of cattle is plummeting, pork prices are skyrocketing and the population is entering an “era of confusion” about what is allowed to eat. At a time when the Daily Mail expects everyone to forgo pizza and eat toast, as a gesture of nationalist solidarity, food shortages stand out as a particularly worrying symptom of geopolitical unrest and viral unpreparedness. Things go well in Amstell’s projections, as the British embrace veganism and learn to live harmoniously with animals (which were imbued with the power of speech, in the soft tones of Joanna Lumley). For many, however, life without the prospect of a melted cheeseburger still represents a worse fate than death.
Johnny Mnemonic
In 1995, the eccentric cultured Robert Longo predicted that the internet would become too big and immersive for the good of humanity itself, eventually becoming so important to our daily activities that it would begin to consume our psychology. He also predicted the consolidation of corporate influence in a handful of mega-conglomerates, with power centered around Asian markets. The only thing this cyberpunk seer was wrong was that we would all look great while the world went to hell, outfitting Keanu Reeves’ human flash drive and the pharmaceutical mercenaries chasing him with immaculate slimming suits. Aesthetics aside – virtual styles would leave CGI awkward and primitive of Longo’s electronic dimension behind – his notion of a consumer online existence that replaces our own real-life experiences was right. As the younger generations struggle with the blurring of the lines between their authentic selves and their outward-looking alter egos on social media, Johnny’s neural implants shuffling his conscience begin to appear redundant. A few years on Twitter can create holes in your brain just as easily.
Moon Zero Two
The august Hammer Film Productions reigned supreme during the 1950s with its vividly bloody revivals of classic ghouls like Dracula, Frankenstein’s monster and the mummy. But in the following decade, its relevance began to wane and left producers struggling to figure out what the next big success would be. The studio tried to turn to science fiction and had little success, its 1969 lunar adventure left aside by audiences and critics as laughable, but without being too funny. Never mind the peanut gallery at Mystery Science Theater 3000, however; there is some substantial truth in director Roy Ward Baker’s treatment of space exploration like a gold rush, sending capitalist competitors scrambling to stick their flag. Rumors of a gigantic asteroid made of pure sapphire oppose an arrogant millionaire against a daring astronaut in a race to claim him, a conflict not far from the ongoing dispute between Virgin Galactic, Northrop Grumman and half a dozen other commercial interests interested in commercializing the galaxy. Baker had the foresight to realize that incineration by extraterrestrials would not be the main risk when venturing into other worlds – just the wealthy megalomaniacs back home on Earth.
Resisting you
The great Japanese animation artist Makoto Shinkai did not look far ahead to this fantastic parable of environmentalism, which advanced only two years after its release in 2019. He suggests that the future is now and that the issues raised by the subtext of his script already matter for the present moment – that is, the well-founded concern about global warming, rising water levels and inevitable planetary drowning. The Tokyo teenager Hodaka cannot believe what she sees when she meets the ethereal Hina, a “sun girl”, able to control the climate at the expense of the integrity of her own body. She is a finite natural resource, used throughout the film until she has no choice but to fly into the sky just to keep the rains in check. Shinkai’s unexpected conclusion, in which Hina returns to Earth and allows the sea to swallow much of Japan, makes the stimulating proposal that we might be better off this way. We have lived recklessly for a long time, and if our species is going to get what it deserves, all we can do is accept our destiny we have built and try to find some inner peace.
Resiklo
A wasteland, disorderly bands of survivors, insect invaders, you know what to do. What sets this Philippine production apart from the many similar entries of its kind is its artistic garbage medium, the production design guided by the plot within the universe that manufacturing ceased due to the lack of materials and the human race became a scavenger. Using all the rubbish they can get their hands on, the rebellion must mount a crazy offensive against “locusts” and mutant homo sapiens in collusion with them, while preserving the classified location of the recyclable sanctuary known as Paraíso. Their struggle for freedom begins with everyone plunged into a problem that many still deny today, while the expansion of plastic land masses floats ominously in the middle of the Pacific. Reality is confronting us with strict physical limits everywhere – cloud servers for storing data, the unfeasibility of fossil fuels – and soon we will have to learn how to be content with what we have. Otherwise, it is only a matter of time before we are all subsisting on gelatin made from ground cockroaches, although this one comes from Snowpiercer.
Looking for a friend at the end of the world
All of these films show gloomy results, but Lorene Scafaria’s debut in the feature is the only one that finds an optimistic way to see the whole devastation. His unbalanced comedy begins with the news that we all have three weeks before a huge flaming rock destroys our fragile blue-green marble and extinguishes all life in it. For the middle-aged suicide bomber Dodge Petersen (Steve Carell), the certainty of annihilation really takes him out of his numb stupor and teaches him to appreciate the time he has left, which he spends mostly with the charming Penny Lockhart (Keira Knightley) in an end of day trip. They find solace in each other, a practical lesson on how to maintain sanity during an emergency that makes everyone else run like a chicken. Whether our forgetfulness comes by artificial or organic means, we will only have each other as light in those dark days. Some may choose to fight back, but some may yield to any great cataclysm that befalls us, and they may just have the right idea. Do you prefer to live 50 years in austere and dangerous conditions, or spend a brief but glorious time, free from regrets and consequences?