The internet and, by extension, social media are digital representations of our best and worst selves. They are generators of enormous change for social issues, politics, our love lives, and especially our “trolling” tendencies. They can enact positive change by connecting us to networks larger than we ever thought possible, but also instigate negative change by exposing us to uninformed opinions and invisible haters. This phenomenon has given rise to dozens of filmmakers’ attempts to represent the conundrum in their work from David Fincher’s The Social Network to South Park’s more satirical take in their recent serialized seasons, and indie films at the Sundance Film Festival like Ingrid Goes West. This week’s Staff Pick Premiere was one of multiple social media sendups featured at this year’s Sundance. For me, Andrew Fitzgerald’s frighteningly accurate and surprisingly succinct depiction of the social media landscape in his short “I Know You From Somewhere” was the most terrifying for its representation of our online culture.
Recently named one of Filmmaker Magazine’s “25 New Faces of Independent Film,” Fitzgerald is making his mark as a filmmaker who isn’t afraid of uncomfortable, darkly comic stories about modern society. His previous Staff Picked short, “Strange Men,” also treads this territory. In “I Know You From Somewhere” we follow Katherene, a young woman in Los Angeles looking for love in all of the prescribed places, i.e., Tinder. After diving into the app’s catalog of people, she surfaces with what seems to be a normal guy who can spell and wears shirts, but soon, as the magic begins to fade, her restless mind starts to fester with doubt and anxiety. And her darkest fears become reality: through social media, she discovers she is being cheated on. Because online life is completely devoid of context and real life is all context, she decides to confront her boyfriend and lover about this tryst. However, her impassioned speech spins out of control as a surreptitiously and shitty cellphone recording of it goes viral due to the uploader’s unfortunate misinterpretation of her words. What happens next is all too familiar: shame, ridicule, misogyny, public humiliation, and outright hatred are directed at Katherene, or the idea of her. Because, you know, sanctimony comes cheap online.
The intention of “I Know You From Somewhere” is hard to argue with — online culture does foster some nasty and often hostile communities and we need a reckoning. The fleeting nature of the news cycle generates stupid slogans, hackneyed observations, shameless self-promoting, and — increasingly — fake news. Fitzgerald even muses that “the ‘attention economy’ that [big tech companies] created has homogenized news, entertainment, commerce, and politics and made sensationalizing trivial matters and keeping people in a perpetual state of outrage valuable — but valuable to them alone. We become addicted to this relentless stream of tabloid trash and what does the world get in return? Don Trump and pop-up ads.” It’s not a very flattering view for the future, but it gets at something deeply important: does 140 characters allow us the nuance needed to solve for the complex issues of our time? The short answer is no.
There aren’t hugs and Hollywood endings here, but rather a somber acceptance that life sucks. However, the genius of “I Know You From Somewhere” is that somehow you chuckle while swallowing that bitter pill. For those of you who might watch this and think, “I know Andrew from somewhere,” you might not be wrong. You can see his editing skills on display in the satirical show Nathan For You and Adult Swim’s Dream Corp LLC. For his own projects, he has just completed a feature script adaptation of this short and is looking to make it before the world goes totally to hell. If Filmmaker Magazine placing Andrew in their newest echelon of promising filmmakers with “I Know You From Somewhere” is his first minute of fame, we can’t wait to see what his next 14 minutes bring.Check out more of Vimeo’s Staff Pick Premieres here.
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