Onboard Diary

'We could have saved it, but we didn't'

Even though it's about the future of humanity; this film is equally or even more important for representing the future of Cinema, of film culture and its marketing and distribution.

Since we found out about the existence of The Age of Stupid, the film became a wonderful role model for the team of Cosmonaut. The way in which the project was presented in their website, the thermometers which they used to represent what they had achieved and what they had left, the generosity in wanting to share with the audience and with other film makers how to carry out similar initiatives, the amount of people who they got to move and motivated to participate in the project. All this wasn't but inspiring us. After all, The Age of Stupid, an indie documentary, had succeeded in doing what only Hollywood-endorsed films -and mainly, the giant marketing engines which normally accompany them- had achieved: a worldwide premiere in cinemas on the same day.
 
It wasn't necessary to go that far: the documentary had already achieved what any indie film today which adventures into the use of alternative production and distribution is longing for: to involve and move its audience and transmit this to others at the same time. Director Franny Armstrong, unintentionally became the best case study of a film maker who successfully achieves to use the new tools and means of communication with which the Internet provides creators, so that their message can have an echo and more impact.
 
What's the problem? Expectations are huge. And the possibility of fulfilling them is so small. I saw the documentary which they presented for The Guardian a day before the premiere and I thought I was about to see a film which would change my life. Maybe I was too naïve, or maybe the documentary wasn't half as good as it promised to be. I know that, just like me, many others felt disappointed. This could be harsh criticism, but it's rather a call to action for all those indie film makers who try to spread their projects through similar scenarios: their films don't rise to the buzz generated around them. This could be a very off-putting start, but I actually think that it's a sensational challenge. The consequence of having a good offer of films is that you create a demanding audience and this can only be a positive thing for the future of cinema.
 
  
Nevertheless, I have to admit that the people behind The Age of Stupid understood or at least, they have made us understand, that showing a film in a cinema isn't only another stop in the traditional chain of film exhibition and distribution. Film projections are to film makers what concerts are to musicians: the collective enjoyment of something extraordinary and unique. The new means of communication, in spite of what many people think, aren't fighting with films in cinemas, they won't make these disappear. On the contrary, they will force the experience of going to the cinema to be revaluated, the experience of seeing a film in a theatre full of strangers, a theatre in the dark where we are all seeing the same thing but the feelings caused in each one of us are unique and unrepeatable.
 
Being a film maker today is incredibly exciting. But being a cinema-loving spectator is even more exciting. In a way, The Age of Stupid is a little taste for this. And the truth is, even though it lacks many things, it still tastes really, really good.