The iMom [Short Film Review]

Albert Einstein once wrote… « It has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity. » From the way we meet and interact with people to the innumerable robots and machines that have come to replace actual real-life persons, technology has radically changed and – on many levels – damaged the way we live.

The iMom is an award-winning short film by Ariel Martin, which tells the story of the very sophisticated mother substitute/nanny robot, named the iMom, that supposedly changes lives… at least, according to the ads and the corrupted TV/news broadcasters. But when a mother leaves her kids under the supervision of the family’s iMom, an unexpected connection is formed…

Through some ethereal vocals at the beginning and end of the film, Ariel Martin gives his audience a sense of something unreal and out of this world – horrific somehow, especially in one of the last scenes, where the iMom puts the chicken to bed instead of the baby -, while at the same time showing that this unthinkable situation has in fact become very concrete.

The very dark and sombre cinematography, on some other level, only betrays the storyteller’s quite negative and pessimistic view on society; indeed, The iMom features two main criticisms – an obvious one is about technology taking over our lives, and a more underlying one deals with parenting, and more specifically with selfish and therefore careless parents.

The film is made out of a mix of TV sequences and an independent story, setting up the contrast between the digital & media hubbub and the profound solitude it causes at the same time. However, The iMom also underlines the comfort some people find in technology and what it has to offer – a comfort they might not always find in their own substantial life.

« By their fruits, you shall know them. The world is the tree and I am the fruit. So what does that say about the world? » concludes the iMom in a final scene… What it says is what Ariel Martin says through this short film, that humans have been creating their own misery all along…

* Watch the short film *

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