Anemoia: Sci-Fi Drama on Nostalgic Yearning and Imagining the Unreachable

Zachary Karem’s sci-fi Anemoia explores nostalgia for times other than these, theirs, ours. A true example of the allure of greener grass, the film illustrates just how romantic everything we do not have can look. But to think of it as finger wagging in that direction would be to miss recognizing the loneliness of being just one thing, even more when you feel its inescapability. 

Most of the 20-minute film is episodic, constructed like fleeting glimpses a time traveller might catch while passing by. Penelope Eaton as the Blonde Girl (blame the credits) wants to return to a simpler time, the 2020s (worth at least a chuckle), and when she gets there, she meets the Driver (Zachary Karem) and his brother, the Passenger (Brennan Karem); two men who want nothing more than to escape to the future. What Eaton and the Karems’ characters have in common is their yearning for a different place, and their loneliness where they exist. In short, they are exactly where they should be: with everyone else around them who are experiencing the same feeling. It is why, when they meet, Blonde Girl and Driver seem to fall in love almost immediately, as if recognising on sight the mutual intensity with which they yearn, and which drives them to action. At least for one of them, it is easy—from the modern comfort of their home. 

Which brings us to some of the most interesting moments of the film: the first act before Blonde Girl makes her journey to the past. As the film lays out her very relatable and even amusing romanticisation of our times, the relationship of the future to the past emerges in a fascinating way. At this point in the film, the narrative inverts the general sci-fi convention of emphasis on the future; instead, it renders the past, i.e., our present, recent past, and near future, alien, and therefore worth the perusal—think vinyls as a relic so far in the past that it cannot be framed or seen in familiar ways. Or even the sheer force of wonder of feeling the sun and wind in your face while riding in the back of a truck as though for the very first time—so much of an adventure that it changes the frame to a more fitting wide aspect ratio. Eaton brings life to these shots. It is easy to look in her face and feel some of that exhilaration with her. 

Anemoia articulates what by now feels like an essential condition of existence whether personal or political. To imagine something more, something other than this, regardless of whichever misguided action it may lead to, feels essential to continue existing at all. 

Watch Anemoia Short Film Trailer