Director: Adele Tulli
Writer: Adele Tulli
Synopsis: REAL aims to delve into the ongoing metamorphoses triggered by our relationship with digital technologies, through an associative mosaic of stories, shedding light on different aspects of living in a hyper-connected reality.
Eight years ago, Eduardo Williams premiered a film at the Locarno Film Festival that not only won him the Golden Leopard–one of the top coveted prizes in Europe–but silently redefined modern filmmaking and the visual language as we know it. That film was The Human Surge, a fragmentary piece about the alienation of today’s youth and how technology has both helped and distanced them through these social media-induced times. Not so many people have heard about this film. Upon its release, it did not make much of a splash in the U.S. cinema market; Williams’ cinematic experiment caused more waves across Europe and Asia. However, as the years have passed and people have grown more dependent on technology, The Human Surge has become more prominent worldwide.
More people have started to bask on what drew the 2016 Locarno jury into Williams’ inventive world. It is a creative and transcending feature that looks vastly different from most films we see today. With the use of virtual reality, he put the audience in a trance where we were stuck in between realms: physical existence and the artificial one caused by technology. The Human Surge was an out-of-body experience; the images stuck with you for days and maybe weeks. You kept thinking about the film even though, from the initial viewing, it was hard to express your thoughts about it. Williams followed it up with The Human Surge 3. Although it was a bit messier than its predecessor, he created yet another fascinating, experimental portrait of our hyper-connected world.
Illusory imagery covered the canvas throughout the film via Williams’ use of the Insta360 titan camera. That helped him cover the world around him, traveling from one country to another like a ghostly presence. Director Adele Tulli has taken these two films as an influence to tell us her own thoughts about people and their connection to technology, both as a remedy for this lonely, cold world and an excuse not to explore your surroundings. For her latest work, REAL (screening at this year’s Locarno Film Festival at the Concorso Cineasti del Presente program), Tulli delves into the relationship we all have with social media, told through a mosaic-like structure that shows the different variations of this bond.
There is no narrative structure to REAL. Instead, we get small fragments into people’s lives worldwide and their format of choice. Whether vlogging on Twitch or YouTube, going on Only Fans, or just talking to an assistive A.I. like Siri or Alexa, these people we see on screen are all using these programs daily, acting like their own obsessions. Even though the title of this film suggests that there is a form of tangibility or palpable human element able to be perceived by all five senses, Tulli more so prompts how this means of communication and connection is “real” and emotionally perceptible to these people. Some of them even get a chance to speak more broadly about why they stream or do videos, particularly during a montage of recollections in which we see content creators opening up about their struggles and how their community helps them feel better.
Even though you might have a specific misconception or be dubious about content creators or influencers, you understand them deeply. The world is cold, and many people fear the harmful things that happen once they open up to the world. So, they use social media, video games, and other outlets to express themselves more profoundly. Through the networks, you have more room to find people with the same interests, sensibilities, and preferences as ever. Everybody has found friends in these mediums, yet, somehow, there is still this preconception made by our addiction to them. Adele Tulli does not shy away from the drawbacks that social media has on us. But that exploration comes across as rather bland and too on the nose.
Tulli is more interested in the positives than the negatives, which makes her project lack that long-lasting curiosity about our “dependence”. If you are covering this topic, you should be open to dissecting it thoroughly, especially since it is very prevalent. Nevertheless, Tulli immerses herself and the audience in this hyper-connected world, like a world tour, to see various perspectives. What Tulli does here is similar to the two Human Surge films that Williams has made so far. The latest documentary by Benjamin Ree, The Remarkable Life of Ibelin, also comes to mind. The acclaimed Sundance doc centered on parents finding out after their son’s death that he was not lonely or living an isolated life; he had hundreds of online friends who cherished him.
It is yet another exemplary work that showcases the impact of the bonds we make through the Internet. There is less experimental cinematography and a weaker visual language in comparison with the works of Williams and Ree. But the montage style offers a passage into these people’s lives–their joy, anguish, and lingering sadness as the online community saves and deteriorates them slowly but surely–that is fascinating even if the structure itself is flimsy. The whole project has a PowerPoint presentation layout, which hinders the effectiveness of its depiction of topics. Despite its poor editing and lack of a more gripping visual language, everything presented rings true and makes viewers think about their involvement in this hyper-connected world.
