In the movie Dumb and Dumber, Jim Carrey is told by Lauren Holly that there is a one-in-a-million chance of them ever getting together, yet he positively glows when he replies, “So, you’re saying there’s a chance.”
I’m betting I’m the only person to ever see 2020’s deadly serious sci-fi film Last and First Men and have that thought. In Tilda Swinton’s narration, we are told that, despite the tale taking place at the end of humanity’s run in the solar system, “spores” of what I assume are human life starting kits have been disseminated to drift like dandelion seeds at random throughout the universe. I like to imagine these are like chia pets, but which grow people instead. And the chances of these spores finding a place and taking hold are even worse than that of Jim Carrey’s Lloyd getting together with Holly.
Not that the people in this distant future are like us today. Set two thousand million Earth years from now (or a trillion years, for us laypeople), our final evolution is to be very furry, akin to monkeys or bears. We will also have an additional eye on the top of our heads, at the end of a stalk and looking forever at the stars. Sounds to me like something out of Vonnegut.
But it isn’t like we’ll see any images of them, as the presentation is only the narration over near-static imagery. I’m pretty sure the only signs of life in the film are birds flying around the massive concrete structures which occupying the majority of the runtime.
I am going to assume the brutalist architectures we are seeing are largely supposed to the massive structures described in the narration, observatories so tall they actually peak above the atmosphere. That would be a lot of steps, so I bet our last remaining offspring have some impressive glutes.
One thing I do know is these structures are in the Balkans, and I think I recognize some from the many books I have of the architecture of such places, and of abandoned structures, period. I feel there is some odd line a person has crossed when they have more than one book about disused bus stops in countries that were formerly Soviet republics.
You’re probably wondering what exactly will bring about the end of our species, and that is a cloud of “non-luminous gas” which is going to collide with our sun. Our star will then flare up far enough to spare only Neptune. So, I guess it will be time to say goodbye to Uranus and your anus.
For the most part, the outlook of the film is as a bleak as the imagery. We’re told no utopia ever envisioned by our science fiction authors ever came to pass. Also, future humans in their century-long childhood will have to reexperience every thought and mistake of all previous humans, so I pity those who will have to endure me peeing my pants in the third grade.
And yet, in the end, there is some odd solace to the idea the universe will continue beyond us—that, for what is like seconds in the life of the cosmos, there was this amazing era. In the final lines, we’re told “Great are the stars, and humankind is of no account to them. But humankind is a fair spirit whom a star conceived and a star kills.”
Watching this is an odd experience, and it made me consider why Koyaanisqatsi does not have narration. Instead of being immersed in pure imagery, the viewer finds themselves listening to a sci-fi narrative while seeing imagery that sometimes seems to correspond directly to the story points, while leaving us to make our own associations at other times. Honestly, I’m not sure what to make of the occasional shot of an oscilloscope displaying a waveform of Swinton’s voice, and was even more confused during spans of silence in those segments, as we are then just watching a green dot in the middle of the screen.
Icelandic composer Jóhann Jóhansson directs from his co-adaptation of Olaf Stapledon’s novel. Much like the elegiac feel of the largely black-and-white imagery, his score is similarly icy and mournful. The 71 minute runtime feels like a small eternity, and that’s even with five minutes of that being the end credits.
Last and First Men is an interesting experiment, but not one which largely succeeded for me. If nothing else, it is an example of why so many pictures are post-apocalyptic but very few are ever truly about the end of humanity. The reason for that is there wouldn’t really be a story, as it would just simply be the end. As that end, as the cliché goes, will be either by a bang or a whimper. This will sound uncharitable, but here is a movie that shows like it would be like if our species was bored to death.
Dir: Jóhann Jóhansson
Starring Tilda Swinton (and only Tilda Swinton)
Watched on Kino Lorber blu-ray