And the King Said, What a FANTASTIC MACHINE

dir. Axel Danielson, Maximilien Van Aertryck 2023 Sweden, Denmark 88 min.
2023 – Berlin IFF, 2023 – CPH:DOX Copenhagen, 2023 – Sundance FF: World Cinema Documentary Special Jury Award
Filmmakers turn their cameras directly on society to explore, explain and expose how our unchecked obsession with image has grown to change our human behavior.

The camera is a fantastic machine. Filmmakers Axel Danielson and Maximilien Van Aertryck (Ten Meter Tower, Jobs For All!) once again turn their cameras directly on society, this time to explore, explain and expose how our unchecked obsession with image has grown to change our human behavior. From Camera Obscura and the Lumieres Brothers all the way to Youtube and the world of social media, the film chronicles how we went from capturing the image of a backyard to a multi-billion- euro content industry in just 200 years. With an exclusive use of archival and found footage, the film uses the very medium it examines, in a self-reflective yet hilarious montage.

PDF materials

  • Pickup And The King Said, What A FANTASTIC MACHINE – From curiosity to creativity – lesson plan "How does a camera change the world?"

  • Pickup From curiosity to creativity – Screenplay for a documentary film


Other movies from the cycle UW: Academy of Documentary Film. Part 1, Winter semester 2023/24