The 20th Camden International Film Festival (CIFF) begins September 12, bringing documentaries from around the world to Camden and Rockland, Maine through September 15. The festival continues to embrace a hybrid format, enabling cinephiles within the United States to enjoy a selection of virtual screenings from the festival slate online from September 16-30. We have rounded up the 11 science and technology-themed projects to look out for, with descriptions excerpted from the festival’s programmers.
Among the selection below, S&F also recommends Bonni Cohen, Pedro Kos, and Jon Shenk’s Sloan-supported documentary THE WHITE HOUSE EFFECT, which revisits pivotal moments across the late 20th century – including George H. W. Bush’s administration – which could have had an impact in mitigating today’s ongoing climate crisis but failed to do so.
FEATURES
APPLE CIDER VINEGAR. Dir. Sofie Benoot. “A retired narrator from iconic nature documentaries with names like PLANET and EARTH embarks on one last global treasure hunt. Inspired by her kidney stone's curious oval shape, this familiar voice guides us on a whimsical journey, unveiling the hidden wonders of rocks and their gravitational pull on those who dare to look closer. . .”
Still from APPLE CIDER VINEGAR. Courtesy of CIFF.
EASTERN ANTHEMS. Dir. Matthew Wolkow, Jean-Jacques Martinod. “. . . centered around the return of the American Great Eastern Brood X cicadas, a long-distance conversation between two friends becomes the lifeline of an unfinished film. Measuring time through the cicadas' return provides a pulse for a post-pandemic moment in US history and invokes a reflection of our collective futures [ . . .] highlighting the power of nature as it interweaves socio-political narratives and ecological cycles.”
ENO. Dir. Gary Hustwit. “Visionary musician and artist Brian Eno — known for producing David Bowie, U2, Talking Heads, among many others; pioneering the genre of ambient music; and releasing over 40 solo and collaboration albums — reveals his creative processes in this groundbreaking generative documentary: a film that’s different every time it’s shown.”
WELCOME INTERPLANETARY AND SIDEREAL SPACE CONQUERORS. Dir. Andrés Jurado. “In 1963, NASA astronauts underwent survival training in the Colombian jungle. Amongst them was Neil Armstrong. Through creative use of archival footage, documents, and sound recordings, the film explores this surreal encounter, presenting a counter-history that examines colonialism, space exploration, and historical memory. . .”
Still from WELCOME INTERPLANETARY AND SIDEREAL SPACE CONQUERORS. Courtesy of CIFF.
THE WHITE HOUSE EFFECT. Dirs. Bonni Cohen, Pedro Kos, Jon Shenk. “When George H.W. Bush won the presidency in 1988, scientists had already been warning for years of the dangers of global warming. Bush promised to counter the ‘greenhouse effect’ with the ‘White House Effect,’ but his administration’s ties to the fossil fuel industry soon undermined efforts to environmentalist intentions.”
WILFRED BUCK. Dir. Lisa Jackson. “Moving between earth and stars, past and present, this hybrid feature documentary follows the extraordinary life of Wilfred Buck, a charismatic and irreverent Indigenous elder who overcame a harrowing history of displacement, racism, and addiction by reclaiming ancestral star knowledge and ceremony.”
SHORTS
A BODY CALLED LIFE. Dir. Spencer MacDonald. “A self-isolated young human delves into the hidden world of microscopic organisms, forging a tender connection with these nearly invisible creatures and developing a massive online following, as he seeks to understand his own place in the cosmos and accept the scars of his past.”
THE COMEBACK MILL. Dir. Josh Gerritsen. “In Maine, where paper mills have long been central to communities, an architect and chemist embark on a multimillion-dollar project to repurpose a closed paper mill in Madison, transforming it into a wood fiber insulation manufacturing facility over four years.”
DULL SPOTS OF GREENISH COLOURS. Dir. Sasha Svirisky. “War for our attention has suddenly become an actual war. Information technologies appear not just as mere means for somebody’s ends but as something having their agency, as one of the acting forces rendering possible a horrific event, which is very hard to accept and almost impossible to comprehend. We have no control over it and are doomed to scroll through the newsfeed.”
Still from DULL SPOTS OF GREENISH COLOURS. Courtesy of CIFF.
FAMILIA. Dir. Picho Garcia, Gabriela Pena. “With the help of his friends, Picho coordinates through WhatsApp to get a profile picture that represents him. Meanwhile, there’s a crisis on the family WhatsApp chat: the demand to be present during the dizzying loss of autonomy of his grandfather, the patriarch of the family. Between missed calls, bombardment of images, emojis and stickers, we access the digital intimacy of a young man conflicted with the expectations of others and his own.”
PERFECTLY A STRANGENESS. Dir. Alison McAlpine. “In the dazzling incandescence of an unknown desert, three donkeys discover an abandoned astronomical observatory and the universe. A sensorial, cinematic exploration of what a story can be.”
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