A Film for Our Times

Posted on April 8, 2003 in Film

On an off chance at Blockbuster, I picked up No Such Thing, a production out of American Zoetrope Studios. It deserves cult status, at the very least, and probably a viewing by thoughtful people who seek myths for our time.

The world’s population is growing at an astounding rate and a being which has watched us evolve from “pond scum” lives in despair on an isolated sea stack off the coast of Iceland. Electronic signals penetrate even his dreams. His immortality and the burgeoning influence of billions of people are driving him mad: he wants to die like the humans that repel and fascinate him can.

Enter a television news crew. Imagine an off screen slasher fest and a tape recording that brings the fiance of one of the men to the beast’s lair. Then put him in New York City among the beings he loathes, with a promise to the girl not to lose his temper, not to kill “the poison ivy of the Universe” around him. Imagine him as the thrall of a government seeking to understand him for the purpose of weapons research and a news network wanting to use him to drive up its ratings in a world gone mad.

Now, think about the present war and all the information which is pounding your head through the television screen, the newspapers, the Net, and the radio. You’ll see how the monster is us.

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