All Light, Everywhere – first look review | Little White Lies

Festivals

All Light, Every­where – first look review

01 Feb 2021

Words by Hannah Strong

Closed eyes and face of golden figure surrounded by glowing aura and wires
Closed eyes and face of golden figure surrounded by glowing aura and wires
Rat Film direc­tor Theo Antho­ny delves deep into the myr­i­ad eth­i­cal quan­daries con­cern­ing mass surveillance.

We’re used to being watched. Since the intro­duc­tion of the first com­mer­cial­ly-avail­able CCTV sys­tem in the Unit­ed States in 1949, sur­veil­lance has become part of our every­day lives – indeed, it’s easy to for­get about it entire­ly, from the cam­eras that observe us as we shop to the ones worn by on-duty police offi­cers, pur­port­ed­ly for the pro­tec­tion of both cop and criminal.

Build­ing on the soci­o­log­i­cal con­cerns of his 2016 debut, Rat Film, Theo Anthony’s lat­est doc­u­men­tary explores the rela­tion­ship between tech­nol­o­gy and polic­ing (specif­i­cal­ly in Bal­ti­more), how sur­veil­lance has evolved, and the very act of seeing.

Ear­ly in the film, Antho­ny is giv­en a guid­ed tour of Axon Enter­pris­es, the com­pa­ny respon­si­ble for invent­ing the Taser. They design and pro­duce hard­ware for the mil­i­tary, law enforce­ment agen­cies and com­mer­cial­ly, includ­ing the body cam­eras which have become stan­dard issue across the US. Steve Tut­tle, the exec­u­tive who leads the way around the offices, is dis­con­cert­ing­ly cheer­ful, and Antho­ny allows the audi­ence to fill in the blanks about the irony of a weapons com­pa­ny pro­duc­ing tech­nol­o­gy intend­ed to pre­vent its misuse.

Else­where, we’re giv­en a pot­ted his­to­ry of sur­veil­lance tech­nol­o­gy, includ­ing the fas­ci­nat­ing tech­nique of pigeon pho­tog­ra­phy pio­neered by Ger­man phar­ma­cist Julius Neubron­ner. The pho­tographs of birds with cam­eras around their necks are com­i­cal, per­haps even absurd – but along­side the expla­na­tion of Pierre Jules César Janssen’s revolver, it reminds us that pho­tog­ra­phy and mil­i­tary pur­suits have always been linked. For as long as humans have been tak­ing pic­tures, they have sought a way to weaponise them.

Although sur­veil­lance tech­nol­o­gy is meant to pro­tect us, Antho­ny under­mines this notion by show­ing damn­ing police train­ing ses­sions, as well as high­light­ing how body cam­era tech­nol­o­gy is designed to record what the police offi­cer sees, not what they’re doing. At a Bal­ti­more com­mu­ni­ty meet­ing, a man argues with a sales­man who is attempt­ing to roll out sur­veil­lance drones in the city that would track move­ments on the streets in real-time; he then lam­basts Antho­ny for film­ing him with­out per­mis­sion. It’s a moment that forces us to ques­tion who real­ly ben­e­fits from know­ing our every move: the audi­ence, or the per­son behind the camera?

It’s a lot to take in, and a lot of ground is cov­ered in just under two hours. A bold epi­logue under­writes the trans­paren­cy Antho­ny is hunt­ing through­out the film, even if it does per­haps feel like a bit of a non-sequitur. But a film about how unre­li­able film can be is a fas­ci­nat­ing con­cept, and All, Light Every­where is a rich achieve­ment, brim­ming with ideas. We’re encour­aged to ques­tion every­thing before our eyes: even the film we’re watch­ing. You’ll cer­tain­ly think twice when you next look at a secu­ri­ty camera.

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