{"id":2268,"date":"2009-04-09T11:12:27","date_gmt":"2009-04-09T19:12:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ogre.nu\/wp\/?p=2268"},"modified":"2009-04-09T13:08:08","modified_gmt":"2009-04-09T21:08:08","slug":"deathist-movie","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bendwavy.org\/wp\/?p=2268","title":{"rendered":"deathist movie"},"content":{"rendered":"

In Renaissance<\/i> (2006)<\/a> there’s a Big Sinister Corporation whose advertising tagline is “Health, Beauty, Longevity.” Oo, scary! I don’t think we’re ever told what Avalon sells (vitamins? cosmetics? medical treatment?) but it doesn’t matter. The noirish visual style suffices to notify us that there are no white hats.<\/p>\n

Some years back Avalon’s top scientist Jonas Muller, who had been studying progeria, dropped out to run a charity clinic. Now another promising scientist, Ilona Tasuiev, has vanished.<\/p>\n

Eventually we learn that Muller dropped out because he found the secret of immortality; to let Avalon bring it to market would be a Really Bad Thing. Muller has kidnapped Tasuiev because she found the same secret and does not share his fear of it.<\/p>\n

I kept expecting someone to reveal that the Muller Protocol involves sacrificing children, but no: immortality is bad because “without death, life has no meaning,” a truth which the writers hold to be self-evident. So in the end Karas, the detective assigned to find Tasuiev, shoots her in the back to save humanity’s soul; and tells her sister that she needed to disappear for her own safety, but don’t worry, she’ll be fine.<\/p>\n

Oddly enough the movie does suggest a better reason to think immortality isn’t all good. Muller’s progeria subjects included his own brother, who apparently is now immortal but mentally damaged – though he doesn’t get enough attention to make this clear.<\/p>\n

The movie is animated in (mostly) one-bit monochrome. This gimmick is occasionally used very well, as when Tasuiev finds herself in a surreal arboretum; but the show is long enough to use up its novelty. I found myself wondering whether the characters see their world as we do.<\/p>\n

. . . In recent years I’ve read a fair amount of fiction (e.g. by Greg Egan<\/a>) in which the abolition of senescence is treated as an unremarkable feature of the background. Is there anything like that in visual media?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

In Renaissance (2006) there’s a Big Sinister Corporation whose advertising tagline is “Health, Beauty, Longevity.” Oo, scary! I don’t think we’re ever told what Avalon sells (vitamins? cosmetics? medical treatment?) but it doesn’t matter. The noirish visual style suffices to … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23,32],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2268","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-cinema","category-luddites"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bendwavy.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2268","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bendwavy.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bendwavy.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bendwavy.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bendwavy.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2268"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/bendwavy.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2268\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2280,"href":"https:\/\/bendwavy.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2268\/revisions\/2280"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bendwavy.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2268"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bendwavy.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2268"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bendwavy.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2268"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}