The task here is like sitting through a staff meeting at, let's say, ACME WIDGETS INC., trying to define what a widget is. A diverse crowd leads to lots of cheap drama, and there's plenty of fears and tears. Another metaphor would be the usual first day of class in grade school with the usual sizing up of the classmates and curriculum. The filmed session is technically unsatisfying, the participants pretentious, and the whole experience ends up exactly as you'd expect it to. Leigh Ledare's project is ultimately undaring and becomes a rather derivative experiment in the usual discomfort of in-person social interaction in the age of the cell phone.
Plot summary
A film directed by Ledare during a three-day conference that he organized in Chicago that was structured according to the Tavistock method—a project that involved recruiting 30 participants, securing the collaboration of 10 psychologists trained in the method, and directing a film crew. Complex patterns of stereotyping and other projections of identity emerge through the participants’ discussions; authority is questioned, assumed, and taken away; and viewers are implicated as the participants become aware of subjective forces that exist beyond the imposed boundaries of the conference system.
Uploaded by: FREEMAN
January 15, 2023 at 05:24 AM