A criticism often levelled at the EU is that its aims and projects are opaque. So what do you do when you want to get a clear, simple message across to the public? A six-minute high concept CGI-filled art film in two acts.
Yesterday your correspondent went to the cinema to see Rien à Declarer, an enjoyable Franco-Belgian comedy about two custom guards on the border and the political construct that is Belgium. Before the main feature, however, the audience was treated to this micro-epic, which combines the inscrutability of David Lynch, the aesthetics of Jean-Jacques Beineix’s Diva and the computer fakery of James Cameron into a Euro-Pudding of shiny incomprehensibility.
Innovation Union Act I, which you can watch here, stars a transparent ball which rolls through the offices of various good-looking, metrosexual Europeans. First, a man who looks like a cross between George Clooney and Julian Assange gets stuck in an elevator because of the little shiny ball, before it smashes the lightbulb in cut-price-Javier Bardem’s office. Then it rolls around, sparkling, before sneaking into the handbag of an attractive blonde, long-legged scientist (what other kind are there in the movies?). So far, so confusing.
At this point, popcorn-fuelled speculation was rife about which company could afford such a long and glossy advertisement in these financially-straitened times. Leaving us with a gripping cliffhanger – does the ball want to help our non-geographically-specific Euroinnovators? Or is it going to leave little bits of glass all over Lady Scientist’s fancy European auto? Perhaps it’s twinkling because it’s a vampire from Twilight? Why is EuroClooney’s elevator in the future?
The suspense did not last long. Act II consists of the same combination of dramatic orchestral music, special effects and dialogue-free acting, with the ball now surrounded by words representing the aims of the European Commission’s Innovation Union. Better Aging! Waste Management! Jobs! It’s like watching the EU Commission’s Midday Briefing with all the verbs missing. There’s also enough animation of futuristic three-wheeled cars to keep the Jury at this year’s Annecy Festival happy.
Having watched the ‘Making Of’ Documentary, the creative minds behind the film explain the sphere symbolizes action, stands for movement, and triggers a series of events. It all makes perfect sense now – perhaps the next EU promotional films could use conceptual art cinema to break down subsidiarity or comitology?