Her 2013
A lonely writer (Joaquin Phoenix) falls for an operating system that learns to feel, then outgrows him.
The Future on Screen
Screenings
These films are not about one single technology. Every one of them is about how technology rewrites the image, consciousness, the body and reality itself.
Three currents, three questions. Restored cult and genre-defining classics, visionary anime, late-night After Dark and big-screen family favourites, grouped into three themes: synthetic selves, the vision of the future, and reality as a system you can rewrite. Live action and animation run side by side in every theme, across all three days. The festival closes with Blade Runner: The Final Cut.
STRAND01
Synthetic Self
Can a machine become someone?
The Iron Giant 1999
A boy (Hogarth) befriends a giant metal robot fallen from the sky, who must choose whether to be the weapon it was built as, or someone better.
S1m0ne 2002
A fading director (Al Pacino) replaces his runaway star with a digital actress the whole world believes is real.
Metropolis 2001
In a towering future city, a robot girl (Tima) who does not know she is a machine searches for who, and what, she really is.
A.I. Artificial Intelligence 2001
A robot boy (Haley Joel Osment) built to love spends centuries trying to become a real child.
Upgrade 2018
After an implant restores a paralysed man (Logan Marshall-Green), the AI inside his body wakes up and starts taking control.
2001: A Space Odyssey 1968
A sentient computer turns on the astronauts (Keir Dullea) it was built to serve.
Ghost in the Shell 1995
A cyborg agent hunting a memory-hacking criminal questions whether her mind is anything but code.
Blade Runner: The Final Cut 2007
A weary detective (Harrison Ford) hunts artificial humans who only want to live longer.
STRAND02
Vision of the Future
The worlds we are heading toward.
WALL-E 2008
A lone robot left to clean a ruined Earth chases love across the stars.
The Terminator 1984
A cyborg assassin (Arnold Schwarzenegger) is sent from a machine-ruled future to kill the woman whose unborn son will save humanity. Remastered.
Back to the Future 1985
A teenager (Michael J. Fox) is flung back to 1955 in a DeLorean time machine and must spark his own parents' romance to exist. Day one of the daily 17:30 ritual.
Back to the Future Part II 1989
The DeLorean jumps to 2015 and a stolen almanac warps the present into a dystopia only a second trip through time can undo. The daily 17:30 ritual continues.
Akira 1988
In neon Neo-Tokyo, a biker's psychic powers spiral out of control, in the film that made anime global.
2073 2024
A survivor (Samantha Morton) in a broken future is cut against real footage of today.
Back to the Future Part III 1990
Stranded in the 1885 Old West, Marty (Michael J. Fox) and Doc race to send the time machine, and themselves, back to the future. The ritual lands home.
STRAND03
Reality Is a System
The world is programmable. So are you.
eXistenZ 1999
A game designer (Jennifer Jason Leigh) can no longer tell where the game ends and her body begins.
The Animatrix 2003
Nine animated visions from the Matrix universe, where anime's boldest directors imagine how machines and humans went to war over reality.
Paprika 2006
A stolen dream device lets nightmares leak into waking life.
The Matrix 1999
A hacker (Keanu Reeves) discovers reality is a machine-built simulation and must wake the human race.
Perfect Blue 1997
A pop idol turned actress loses track of which version of herself is real. The last screening before the Gala.
Hackers 1995
A crew of teenage hackers (Jonny Lee Miller, Angelina Jolie) are framed for a corporate cyber-heist and fight back through the wires.
The Social Network 2010
A Harvard student (Jesse Eisenberg) builds the social network that rewires human connection, and burns every friendship to do it.