USERS
A mother wonders, will my children love their perfect machines more than they love me, their imperfect mother? She switches on a smart-crib lulling her crying baby to sleep. This perfect mother is everywhere. She watches over us, takes care of us. We listen to her. We trust her.
Director: Natalia Almada
Executive Producers: Sean King O'Grady, Bill Stertz, Charlotte Cook, Kathryn Everett, Roberto Grande, Rune Hansen, Tony Hsieh, Noah Kadner, Bryn Mooser, Mimi Pham, Mónica Reina
Production Companies: The Department of Motion Pictures, Atlas Industries, XTR, JustFilms/Ford Foundation, No Ficción and Simplemente/FCP Work
Producers: Natalia Almada, Josh Penn, Elizabeth Lodge
"Almada cleverly puts audiences in the same predicament with a film that’s easy on the eyes, feeling impossibly so when the images are often a product of technology that can get into spaces that humans can’t, yet raise plenty of questions about whether an extended reach diminishes human capability or drive."
"The sound and visuals offer a perfectly controlled, almost entrancing experience. The music score by Kronos Quartet and flutist Claire Chase becomes an irreplaceable component of the overall atmosphere. Everything moves at the right speed; everything sounds like from another world."
"...the movie utilizes free-floating and associative editing techniques to evoke an almost meditative sense of inward reflection. If beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so too is a deeper meaning, as Users asks its audience to consider their individual and shared lives as consumers, and all which that entails...."