In Asif Kapadia’s latest documentary, “2073,” Ivanka Trump celebrates 30 years since leading the nightmarish fascist police state that America once was. The docudrama mixes interviews with journalists and archival real-life news footage with a fictional story starring Samata Morton to tell a story about a dystopian future that doesn’t seem too far away.
The film is based on Chris Marker’s 1962 film “La Jetée,” about a time traveler who risks his life to change the course of history and save humanity’s future. “2073” follows Morton, who plays a survivor of a near-future global catastrophe caused by artificial intelligence, climate change, anti-democratic authoritarianism, and technocratic mass surveillance. Morton’s character lives in a nightmarish America led by a fascist police state.
“I felt like questioning what genres people go to cinema and watch,” says Kapadia. “They like horror movies. So I thought, ‘I’ll give you a horror movie.’
The Trump family, the Murdoch family, Vladimir Putin, Benjamin Netanyahu, Xi Jinping, Mohammed bin Salman, Narendra Modi, the Koch brothers, Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Peter Thiel, and many more are featured throughout the documentary. The past is pieced together using footage from around 60 different countries. In the opening scene of the documentary, clips of recent devastation in Gaza are used to reveal a seismic catastrophe.
“This film came out of my gut and feeling about something that was happening globally,” says Kapadia. “The scariest thing in the movie is the truth. The most shocking thing is what real people who are now in power in this country say.”
Supported by Neon, Double Agent and Film4, 2073 debuted at the Venice Film Festival in September and will be released in theaters on December 27.
Kapadia, who won the Academy Award for Best Documentary Feature in 2016 for “Amy,” spoke. diverse About “2073” before the film was released in theaters.
Members of the Trump family are mentioned in the film, which was made long before the 2024 presidential election. If Donald Trump had not won the election, would you have cut the Trump references from the film?
Almost all of the film’s financiers and executives who are from the United States have said at some point: “Why did you put Trump in the movie? Get rid of him.” It was old news when I started working on the film. But the film itself is a time capsule for now. So, even if Trump is not re-elected, (his presidency) happened. Therefore, I refused to remove any references to Trump. This (sequence) in which Ivanka Trump celebrates 30 years in power exists because the idea of a two-term American presidency, I don’t think it will exist forever.
Did you make “2073” a sci-fi/horror documentary to appeal to an audience that doesn’t want to go to a movie theater to watch a documentary?
definitely. With all my films, especially my docs like “Senna” and “Amy,” I want them to come out of the documentary box. I want my films to be shown on the big screen. I want people to be in a dark room and put their cell phones away so they can experience something and then talk about it. I always feel like my films should be as cinematic as possible, and I don’t want to feel like they’re made for TV. So, the whole intention of every movie I make, because I come from that generation, is to bring it to the big screen and make it feel like a movie and compete with every other movie out there.
Is the hope that audiences will watch “2073” and try to make a change?
If people are comfortable, nothing will change. Change comes from fear. Of anxiety and of realizing that we have to do something. Some people think: “It’s not our problem. It’s someone else’s problem. I’m fine.” The aim of the film is to shock and frighten people into action. That’s the idea.
What actions do you recommend taking?
In the film we talk about what life was like before and where we’re going, and then there’s a little bit in between, and it’s like a frog boiling in hot water. We are that frog. We’re in boiling water now, and it’s getting hotter on climate, democracy, journalism, surveillance, and technology. It’s all happening now. So we have to start doing something. If you’re really at a loss for words and don’t know what to do, I would say the main thing about the film is that it’s also an ode to journalism. The journalists we feature who appear in the film – look for them. Read their books. Read their articles. Understand what they stand for, and they will give you solutions.
You started your career as a feature film director. You could have turned “2073” into a sci-fi movie. Why did you decide to make a hybrid document?
Because I’m still taking notes on the script, and everything will be out of date. The thing about fiction is that something happens, and then they turn it into a movie, and I wanted to make a movie before it happened. This movie is coming out as it’s happening. That’s why I’ve lost a little love for fiction; As a process, it is very conservative. It’s full of notes, a lot of development, and a lot of going around in circles. Then you wait for four years to star in the film. I love flipping it on the head. I also find that working on non-fiction and docs on a smaller budget, with a smaller crew and team, and with fewer executives, allows me to follow my instincts.
Were you surprised given the current doc market that Neon took this film on?
A lot of (distributors) don’t want to touch politics. They don’t want to get close to anything political. They don’t want to upset any world leaders because that might affect where their services are available, let’s just say. So I had a dream team because I wanted 2073 to be a theatrical movie, and the people who came on board and believed in me were there all the way through supporting that vision.