Rob Munday
Depending on your viewpoint, technology can either be seen as the scourge or saviour of society and its continual evolution will either cause concern or excitement, depending on this perspective. For filmmaker Sean Buckelew (Another, Lovestreams) his recent work has been intent on exploring these themes and trying to unravel the role technology plays in our lives, ideas that are further expanded in his latest short film Drone.
The story of a CIA drone fitted with an ethical AI, Buckelew was inspired to tell this story after being amused by the phrasing of a headline on a Guardian article, which claimed that military drones were “misunderstood”. With that piece discussing the “image problem of such weapons”, the filmmaker started to reflect on the marketing effort that would go into a full rebrand of such a device. “The press event where the military would attempt to rehabilitate the image of drone warfare (and how it could go disastrously wrong) seemed ripe for satire”, he explains.
The image of a nervous CIA agent and overzealous PR person at a press conference explaining the rebrand of the drone was key in the development of Drone.
With the image of a misunderstood predator drone flying through a romantic sunset circulating in his mind (a vision he immortalised in this lo-fi GIF), Buckelew took these initial ideas and formed that into a narrative which continued his recent focus of looking into the “social and cultural politics of emerging technology” and their impact on the “ubiquity of living in the present moment”. Citing Neil Postman’s Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology as pivotal in constructing the questions asked in Drone, although the filmmaker doesn’t presume to think that his short would have any kind of revelatory political impact, he hopes it captures some very real concerns or anxieties of modern society. In particular, humanity’s “inability to pump the brakes on our own ingenuity, even when it involves our own destruction or acts so morally heinous, they have to be kept at extreme distances”.
With the ideas behind Drone forming in late 2013, after reading the aforementioned Guardian article, the actual production on the film didn’t start until 2019, after Buckelew grew tired of trying to pitch his ideas for TV/episodic development. However, it was a retrospective event at GIRAF, where the filmmaker showed some of his commercial work, alongside his narrative/personal work, which provided motivation to get the production for Drone up and running.
On his flight home from GIRAF Buckelew wrote the premise of Drone under this portrait of his Mom.
“I was really disappointed with how the commercial work felt alongside the personal work”, Buckelew reveals in this extensive ‘making of’ piece on his Substack. “I could feel how worthless it was in a context that actually allowed me to represent my interests as an artist. It felt like a hollow demonstration of marketable skills and cheapened everything else I was showing. Walking back to the hotel that night, I resolved to commit to making another personal film, but more seriously this time, like it was a real production and not just a side hobby.”
Working with a host of collaborators – Jeanette Jeanenne (producer), Wes McClain (backgrounds), Vincent Tsui (character animation), Nicole Stafford (effects), Kyle Brooks (clean up and colouring), Skillbard (sound design) – Buckelew was able to bring his vision to the screen with real impact. Drone is a thought-provoking animation, with the real-life inspiration behind its premise giving it genuine weight. It’s Buckelew’s most ambitious film yet and a clear indicator of the talent he has for not only animation, but prescient, relatable storytelling. Something we hope to see more of in his upcoming work: A new short titled I Am A Robot for FX (working again with most of the Drone crew) and a feature (in early development) called No Glory in the West. He is also a co-executive producer and writer on Scavengers Reign, a series by directors Joe Bennett and Charles Huettner based on their original short.