HyperNormalisation

Saw HyperNormalisation, a political video-essay about a lot things.  It focuses on the loss of a believable vision of the future for the world and the manipulation of perception for the sake of maintaining control.  It was created in 2016, so post-Brexit and post-Trump's election victory, and so came in a potent moment for the western world to understand itself and its current place in the world.  Part history lesson and part philosophy, it presents a coherent interpretation of the world and is therefore to be treated with deep suspicion and hostility.

The film starts its history lesson in the 70s, when 1960s counter-culture was calcifying into drug-worship and communes were transforming into cults.  The soviet union had recently "unthawed" under Khrushchev and western liberals could see clearly the deprivation and bread lines and so forth.  Western liberalism seemed to be in need of a re-think and, this film claims, it retreated from reality into cyberspace (this film, by the way, is chock-full of different factions retreating from reality in various ways.)

That paragraph barely scratches the surface.  The film is fascinating and complex.  It argues that the world has become too complex and too interconnected to be dealt with head-on.  We used to use comforting and ennobling lies to to give us a direction to move in and something to believe in.  Unfortunately, as these lies have been exploded one by one, we are left with nothing but new systems of communication and organization.  There's no system of management or a flatter sort of hierarchy, just people who can talk to more people than ever before.  It's a fascinating, intellectual, cynical, hopeless film that ends just as Trump is coming to power and with a woman weeping with disbelief that Brexit passed.

As with other films that suggest a simple, coherent world view, this one should be treated carefully.  It has the convincing power and barrage of facts and footage to convince you of something which may be a simplification of reality.  It is enough to drive a person into conspiracy theories and into a smug pseudo-understanding of the world.  If you find the ideas presented here compelling, for your own sake and the sake of the people you corner at parties, please follow up with other perspectives and original source material.  This was an interesting movie.  I will not be taking my own advice.