Werner Herzog made a PSA about texting and driving.
It is thirty-five minutes long.
It seems sort of silly to evaluate From One Moment to the Next as a documentary project, even though it's filmed like one. After all, it was commissioned by AT&T to be shown in high schools and government agencies, and features several shots of people reading the message of the short film at the camera lens, after-school-special style: "Don't text and drive. Seriously, don't do it."
If this were a normal documentary, I would find this pedantic, but because Herzog is basically making a PSA he is unapologetically taking the role of your mother telling you to put down your damn phone and watch the road. We do not hear Herzog at all in this documentary, asking questions or providing voiceovers, unlike his feature documentary Into the Abyss. The result is thirty-five uninterrupted minutes of car crash victims giving frank, wrenching accounts of the damage of the accidents they caused, the accidents that the car next to them caused, and the way these accidents upended their lives. It's a glorified version of the anti-drug PSAs we used to watch as kids, and if that sounds like an insult, it's not. It's relevant, refreshingly straightforward, and honest. And like the best warnings, it lets the people who have made mistakes speak for themselves.
I'm linking this because I'm a cyclist and I see dozens of you nutjobs doing this every day. I like my skull the way it is. Don't text and drive.
For more Beth and Louise, follow us on Twitter at @BandLHateMovies or subscribe to the podcast. Give us a rating and leave a comment on iTunes!
No comments:
Post a Comment