EUFF 2022: White on White

Slovakia/Czech Republic | Viera Čákanyová | 2020 | 74 min

This spellbinding, philosophically searching documentary is director Viera Čákanyová’s often breathtakingly beautiful video diary of her sojourn at a remote station in Antarctica. During her stay, surrounded by computers, machines, and vast vistas of snow, she explores the role of technology in this forbidding landscape, and leads conversations examining the nature of film, art, artificial intelligence, and, perhaps inevitably, the meaning of life. Juxtaposing these ruminations with footage from her everyday life at the station and with lyrical images of the stunning natural wonders of Antarctica, White on White offers an original, compelling perspective on humanity’s relationship to nature and to the evermore pervasive technocentric civilization it has constructed.

“A phantasmagoric viewing experience ... Čakányová provides a new starting point for reflection.” Vladan Petkovic, Cineuropa