In the Greek myth of Pandora’s box, a curious woman opens a box and releases all manner of evil into the world. Once the box is open, there’s no closing it, and only hope is left at the bottom. This story came back to me as I watched Lo and Behold, Reveries of the Connected World, Werner Herzog’s rumination on the range of digital systems and devices that govern our world. Divided into ten chapters—each featuring people who are furthering the technology or pushing back against it—the film explores the horrors and the wonders of our current way of life. The inventors of self-driving automobiles speak glowingly of the machines’ ability to learn and adapt, opining that it far outstrips that of humans, while victims of online bullying and addiction call the Internet the work of the devil. These views may seem irreconcilable, but Herzog arrives at a single conclusion: no matter how much technology evolves, it’s still up to us to steer it in the right direction.
Kevin Mitnick, one of the world’s most famous hackers, tells Herzog that, for better or worse, humans are the weak link. When the FBI was after him, he explains, he evaded capture by hacking into the bureau’s cell phones, which he accomplished by sweet-talking people at Motorola. There will always be security breaches, he argues, because there’s no end to our fallibility. Nothing we make will ever completely cover up our flaws, but developments like the Internet at least make it possible to dream of being better than we were yesterday. To counterbalance the dystopian misery described by some of the subjects, Herzog marshals a parade of technology’s greatest hopers and strivers, all of whom believe machines will be our salvation.
Directed by Werner Herzog
