An Impossible Project

I knew that some outfit named Impossible had resurrected Polaroid's SX-70 film production, but had no idea what the story was. Very well done, though it would have benefited from a little actual background on the history of Land and Polaroid, mainly for those young enough to have not been around in the mid-late 20th century.

I was deeply dismayed, though, at facebook's sudden intrusion into the narrative, and at Doc's naivete regarding the damage it's done to the world with its grotesque, self-absorbed amorality. He did his research, and is a smart enough guy to understand its meaning, but still cozied up to them. I could scarcely sit through his initial wooden, stilted meeting in their quaint little print shop, and the extent of the facebook employees' delusion shows in their considering this silkscreening curio to be the "heart and soul" of a truly evil company. That kind of money distorts everything and rarely does anyone any good, regardless of whether they humour a harmless screwball from time to time by picking up the tab for a party. I sincerely hope he's since broken with them.

While it is beautifully shot, and Doc is a wonderfully crazy character, everything in the film felt, well, underexposed. Even Doc. I'm not sure we ever understood anyone's real motives. The film felt very much all over the place, without ever really going anywhere. It's missing the details we need to get to the heart of who these people are, and why they do what they do. And had I not read the Bonanos book on Polaroid, I would have been completely confused as to what was going on with the main story in this film. Also...the most interesting character in this story, the one who truly gave it birth, Edwin Land, is completely glossed over. It just felt like a missed opportunity. (Saw this at DOC NYC 2020 film festival.)

An Impossible Project invites us to reconnect with our senses in this increasingly senseless world through the reclamation of analogue media and technology. It does not make the easy claim that "analogue is better than digital" or vice versa, but rather asks how we may find a balance between digital and non-digital in our rapidly digitising world. It presents us with an opportunity to switch off, step back, and reassess our relationship to digital technology in order to keep ourselves grounded in the physical realm. Especially in the midst of the Covid-era, stuck on Zoom or scrolling social media for hours a day, the film reminds us of the value of tactility, tangibility and the human connection that comes from analogue.

The "impossible project" of saving Polaroid is still a commercial success, but Doc Florian Kaps was rapidly ejected by the new company's owners (He jokes himself: like Steve Jobs previously from Apple Computer Inc.). Next, Facebook has nothing to do with instant picture! They appeared completely by accident in his new challenge about restoring a beautiful, but abandoned classical Grand Hotel. That "single website company with 10'000 employees" hosts in the middle of their new headquarters a tiny so-called "Analog Research Lab", in fact a kind of museum for mechanical printing devices (or even a zoo for theses almost extinct species). But actually, Mark Zuckerberg never entered that door and never made any notable use of it.

An impossible feat in and of itself; an indie film shooting all 35mm. A well told story, beautifully shot. A must see.