Holy Filament opens with the monochrome image of a woman (Emily Van Raay) staring at a scorching ball of fire, the orb illuminating her blank stare. The camera slowly zooms toward the object as an operatic, bellowing voice sounds, accompanied by a reverberating, industrial hum, before cutting to black.
The film follows the woman through her daily routine, although there’s something different about her. Her limbs maneuver in sudden jolts and her voice, which narrates the film, speaks in mechanized, staccato soliloquies. She is a synthetic: a man-made, artificial being. She walks the streets of a smog-covered, desolate cityscape. Looking upward, she describes herself as an “indispensable asset” to an omniscient higher power, her voice possessing an unsettlingly chipper tone.
The city is eerily quiet, empty of any and all natural life. Visually, the film achieves an authentic, palpable feeling of isolation. The soundscape is populated by the occasional whirrs of machinery, a unnerving contrast to the otherwise overwhelming silence. As she leaves work, struts across the city, and boards an empty train car, the robot concludes a droning routine not dissimilar to that of many humans, foreshadowing the lines that will soon be blurred.
Things take an intriguing turn when the synthetic rides the train outside city limits. As she explores what she calls “the spaces beyond”, her monologue begins to slowly turn inward, a sliver of humanity starting to seep through the cracks. Initially, the film acts as a poignant warning against pollution and environmental decay. The narration is aimed directly at the viewer, proclaiming how humans destroyed the planet, leaving it for the synthetics to “remain in our image.” However, as the protagonist reflects on her mortality, or lack thereof, the film’s focus shifts. It acts as not only a critique of humanity’s faults, but also an introspective exploration of what it means to be human. There is a hint of ambiguity as well; did humans destroy themselves, or is that just what she’s been led, or programmed, to believe?
A dystopian memoir evocative of Tarkovsky and Fritz Lang, Holy Filament acts as a haunting what-if, warning, and premonition of what’s to come.
Film Review by Shane McKevitt for Final Cut Magazine
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