2073
Asif Kapadia imagines the world of today viewed from the perspective of 2073.
Image courtesy of Altitude Film Entertainment.
It was by making three hit documentaries in a row – Senna, Amy and Diego Maradona – that Asif Kapadia gained international recognition as a major filmmaker. That development came as a surprise given the nature and quality of Kapadia's award-winning first feature, 2001’s The Warrior, a drama set in feudal India which had carried no hint whatever that documentaries would come to feature so prominently in his work. But with this new piece Kapadia brings these two sides of his output together since 2073 blends a futuristic sci-fi story with even more prominent elements that use archive footage and voice-over comments in a manner characteristic of Kapadia’s documentaries.
With a screenplay by Kapadia and Tony Grisoni, 2073 had its premiere at the 2024 Venice Film Festival and many of the reviews that it received were decidedly unfavourable. My own view is that it is far more worthwhile than those comments would lead one to expect even if there are shortcomings that render it less than a masterpiece. The fictional aspect in it derives from setting the film in 2073, a year that is described as being thirty-seven years after ‘The Event’. Rather than tying this seemingly worldwide catastrophe to any single cause such as climate change or the outcome of a fatal war, the film simply invites us to witness the largely underground life and resistance of a mute woman (Samantha Morton) who, living in what is described as New San Francisco the capital of the Americas, hides from the dictatorial authorities and gets by through scavenging when she emerges onto the streets at night. This woman is old enough to remember her grandmother and to recall what she learnt from her of a life of freedom. Furthermore, she has chosen not to speak ever since she experienced the shock of seeing the grandmother being seized and taken away by those in power.
But it is not only through the visuals that we can identify with this woman and the situation in which she finds herself because despite being mute when she encounters others – there are brief scenes with an AI created figure called Jack (Hector Hewer) and a former teacher (Naomi Ackie) who is also carted away– we hear her thoughts on the soundtrack. It soon becomes clear that Kapadia and Grisoni are evoking a future world close to that envisaged by George Orwell in his novel 1984 (and if that has not occurred to some viewers earlier on then a brief coda after the end credits makes the indebtedness even more apparent). But, whereas Orwell spent his time describing life in a futuristic world dominated by a dictator, the concern here is to show the factors that could lead our own world into the kind of existence depicted as existing in 2073. In doing this, the film lives up to a description featured in the trailer for it: "This is not fiction. This is not a documentary. This is a warning." Opening in the UK on the same day as We Live in Time, the stark message of this film is that democracy is indeed at stake and that it is already later than we think.
In order to make its point 2073 features much documentary footage going back as far as 1990 and not always presenting it in chronological order. And here it becomes appropriate that the so-called ‘Event’ should not be defined in detail because the nature of Kapadia's warning is that no single feature can be identified as our greatest danger but that the threat that exists takes myriad forms and is stronger than we are willing to acknowledge. Thus, it is that while 2073 incorporates footage relating to the consequences of climate change it also references the increased power of technology, the extent of the surveillance of individuals that has followed from that and the way in which in a whole range of countries those who rule have sought to oppose the freedom of those who want independence of any kind (a sequence about the treatment of the Uyghurs is especially striking). The power of corporations and the rise in politics of the far right are part of the picture too. To help all this to cohere Kapadia uses voice-over comments and actual existing footage in which various journalists, authors and historians express their views (they include the likes of Maria Ressa, Carole Cadwalladr, Anne Applebaum and Rahima Mahmut).
Those who dismiss this film partly do so on the grounds that there is nothing here that is not old news. But the fact is that the majority of us seek to limit our fears by isolating these various elements or by distancing them. Each war – Ukraine, Gaza etc. – is for most of us in a distant place and for all the common suffering of ordinary people we choose not to link the impact of wars, of climate change and of autocrats already installed or hoping to be. What 2073 does is to pull all these together in order to make us realise the need to see the connections and to appreciate the extent to which the current state of things requires us to recognise fully the menace for the future that already exists. As for those complacent enough to declare that the film merely serves up old news, I would point out that since 2073 went into production the ties between Trump and Musk now making headlines illustrate the kind of connection foreseen here just as the rapport that we note in a clip of Steve Bannon and Nigel Farage already takes on extra weight.
I have said that 2073 is less than perfect and, if some of the early newsreel footage seems a bit too rushed, it is significantly more important that, despite the very effective performance by Samantha Morton who expresses so much visually, the fictional futuristic side of the film doesn't have quite the weight to provide the appropriate concluding punch that the piece needs. But this part of the film does benefit from Bradford Young's fine widescreen photography and from Kapadia’s cinematic sense (the mix of archive and newly shot material is always adroit, the music score obtained from Anthony Pinto is well judged and at times the visual power here reminded me of the work of the Russian filmmaker Victor Kossakovsky).
I leave to the end my main dispute with hostile reviewers which is with those who seeing little point in this film raised one criticism in particular. I'm thinking here of those who argue that the film is worthless because it doesn't come up with any answers, any solutions to our plight. Do they really think that there are any easy answers, especially any that can be offered at this moment? As events change and decisions have to be made or discussions held in any of the various fields that have been touched on here, those directly involved need to heed the warning so strongly expressed by this film and to act accordingly. That must be what Kapadia would hope for and to expect any more from his film is surely unreasonable. Put it this way: should 1984 be disdained because Orwell didn't find a way to end it on a note of hope? Kapadia is an artist who is a filmmaker rather than a poet but even so as a defence for this heartfelt film he could adapt Wilfred Owen’s famous line "All that a poet can do today is warn".
MANSEL STIMPSON
Cast: Samantha Morton, Naomi Ackie, Hector Hewer and with contributions from Maria Ressa, Rana Ayyub, Carole Cadwalladr, Rahima Mahmut, Ben Rhodes, Anna Applebaum, George Monbiot.
Dir Asif Kapadia, Pro Asif Kapadia and George Chignell, Screenplay Asif Kapadia and Tony Grisoni, Ph Bradford Young, Pro Des Robin Brown, Ed Chris King and Sylvie Landra, Music Antonio Pinto, Costumes Verity May Lane.
Lafcadia Productions/Neon/Double Agent/Film4/HBO Theatrical Documentary-Altitude Film Entertainment.
83 mins. UK/USA. 2024. US Rel: 27 December 2024. UK Rel: 1 January 2025. Cert. 15.
