Blanketyy Review (Short Film, 2020) #31DaysofHorror
A team of researchers and coders are working around the clock on a project that could change the course of literary history. Their goal is to teach a computer AI to write fictional stories. The problem is what the computer produces is not sensible. It goes into a tailspin of possibility, turning the main characters into adjectives, verbs, objects, pronouns, and everything else you can imagine when faced with the infinite possibilities of creation. The Woman in charge of the project is willing to try anything to get the results she wants, putting her and her staff in increasingly strange situations for the sake of innovation.
“Blanketyy” is a short sci-fi/horror film exploring a concept. Director Clara Mamet is less concerned with a linear plot than exploring a surreal world that feels a little too close to our reality for comfort. There are computer programmers who do similar projects already, feeding a custom built program all of the scripts of a TV series or books in a series of novels, then having it generate its own original story in that universe. The results are funny and weird in equal measure, as the computer program is not quite sophisticated enough to understand the nuances and constant rule-bending in the English language.
Mamet wants to go further. The Woman in her film is obsessed with creating sensible stories out of her programming project. The computer is peaking at maybe seven or eight percent sensibility. It starts with a sentence about two people arriving at their friends’ house, then spirals from there.
The challenge is handled from every angle she can imagine. There’s an entire floor of programmers adjusting variables and tracking results. There’s also a separate research unit tracking human input into the system. How do you get data for a computer to analyze and interpret the creation of stories? Have people tell stories.
But what makes a good story? Tension. Conflict. A challenge to overcome. This is where “Blanketyy” goes from sci-fi fascination to horror real quick. We meet one of the research subjects feeding the computer program data. He is stressed. He is overworked. He is on the verge of a complete breakdown over having to tell stories about a dog over and over in different variations in the hope that a faceless computer can make sense of it. He is not the only subject and he is not the only one on the verge of doing something bad or harmful if he doesn’t get a break.
The Woman doesn’t care about him. The Woman cares about her data. It’s actually pretty significant that The Woman, the face of this research project that could change the world, is left unnamed. She is the driving force behind a computer program represented by an ever-changing chart on a black screen. Her identity is the creation of the program, and the program’s identity is the technical analysis of the human experience distilled into literature. The challenge of the program is the challenge of The Woman caught up creating the program. How can something/someone that/who is not living their own life create a life that makes sense?
“Blanketyy” asks a lot of questions without providing any answers. It’s a specific style of sci-fi/horror film that pops up as think pieces at festivals. If you go in looking for a linear story, you might be disappointed. If you go in looking to experience a strange world, you’re more likely to find value in it.
“Blanketyy” is streaming on Shudder.
