Lights, Camera, Surveillance: technology in film

Gus

Welcome to the Tech Pill, a podcast that looks at how technology is reshaping our lives every day and exploring different ways that companies and governments use tech to increase their power. My name is Gus Hosein, and I'm the Executive Director at Privacy International.

Caitlin

And I'm Caitlin, and I'm PI's Campaigns Coordinator. Hi.

Gus

Hello. 

So today we're in for something different. We've been talking about some pretty heavy things over the last few editions, and we thought, why not have a little bit of fun?

Which is, Caitlin actually had the idea that, no, it wasn't actually, Caitlin, it was my idea.

It was my idea. It wasn’t your idea. It was my idea.

Caitlin

It was your idea! I was thinking, I'm not sure, I'm not sure this was my idea.

Gus

Yeah, that we look at some movies. 

[music break]

Why would we do that for you? Well, first, I love movies, all movies.

I've never seen a movie where I've thought, oh, I wish I could get that time back. Just because movies are a beautiful escape. 

Second, I think our stories say something about us, and so the top movies of 2026 might say something about us as a society. And third, you'll hear how one movie spurred all of this. 

But no, look, we're not asking about whether these movies are only socialising surveillance. We're not going to be that basic and annoying, although we'll do a little bit of that. But we're ultimately, and you as an audience, we're all nerdier than that. We're asking as much about the role that technology plays in telling the story and what that says about the story and our approach to technology.

Don't worry, this isn't a huge essay in critical film theory. We dive into the virtues and annoyances of movies like Super Mario Galaxy, Project Hail Mary, Devil Wears Prada 2, Odyssey. And you'll get to hear all about my love of the Toy Story universe.

So without further ado, here we go. 

[music break]

What it all comes down to, really, is that I took my kids to go see Spider-Man, the latest Spider-Man movie. And I love the Spider-Man franchise.

Every Spider-Man franchise there has ever been, dating back to the horrible cartoon TV show back in, I don't even want to say what decade it is, I love them all. I love this current version of Spider-Man. I love all the characters. I love all the actors. I love all the relationships. But boy, did that movie piss me off.

So, I came out of that as angry as I come out of any podcast talking about militarisation of tech and thought, why don't we talk about movies? 

We found a list on Box Office Mojo, which I'd never heard of before, that listed the top movies of 2026. And when we first started looking at this, the list changed to where it is right now as of the moment of recording.

And so, some movies dropped off, such as Sheep Detectives. It sounds fascinating. Or Disclosure Day, which apparently wasn't so fascinating.

Those are movies that we had intended to watch, but then they were no longer in the top 10. Unfortunately, some movies did appear in the top 10 eventually that unfortunately we couldn't stream or we didn't want to pay for to go watch in the cinema, such as, I'm looking at you, Paw Patrol Dino. I don't know if you've ever seen this stuff, Caitlin, but you know what I mean? Some characters are just too annoying. And so, I was grateful that we couldn't stream that. 

I'm a little disappointed we couldn't stream Pegasus 3, which was the top listed Chinese movie, but there's no streaming platform I could find that had it.

Caitlin managed to find Coyote vs. Acme, but I was unable to. But other than that, we did watch the top movies.

Some of them I wish I hadn't seen. And we thought, okay, well, let's look at those movies and ask what?

Caitlin

Well, right. So, when you said, you know, oh, I've just watched Spider-Man, and oh my freaking God, I imagine you used different words. I went back and watched the current Spider-Man franchise, which I hadn't seen.

I think I've seen before this, like in full, like watched from beginning to end, maybe two or three Spider-Man movies, none of the new ones. So, I went and watched them. Not the current one, which actually I couldn't find, but the previous ones.

And I could see what you mean. And I think what's interesting about film and what's interesting about particularly big blockbuster movies is, for us, the way that they treat our issues, even when they're not central, right? And I was watching, God, I think it's the second new Spider-Man movie, which is the one set in Europe, which is called Spider-Man: Far From Home.

Gus

Far From Home, yes. 

Caitlin

And in this movie, Spider-Man, who's like supposed to be a late teenager, he's like 17, 18, I think, gets access to Stark technology, magic glasses, or, you know, in movie very sophisticated AI glasses. And the first thing he does is read all his classmates' text messages, and then accidentally called in a drone strike on his own school bus, because the girl he likes is talking to a boy. 

And I thought, this is supposed to be funny. And it is kind of funny. That's kind of funny. Like, I'm willing to cede it, it's funny. It's also, I think, a really interesting indicator of how people feel, like, about these technologies and how they perceive them, whether they're scary, whether they're, you know, funny, the potential of them, because looking up the girl you have a crush on is a huge problem for these technologies. 

It's a problem we've seen across basically all sophisticated surveillance technologies, most recently in Flock cameras, where loads of police officers in America who have access to these databases, they've been using them to look up people that they're not suspects of crime. There's no legitimate reason to look them up. Sometimes they're ex-girlfriends. Sometimes they're people they're interested in. Sometimes they're, you know, friends of people they're interested in, partners of people they're interested in. And in real life, it's a lot less funny. 

And reading your classmates' text messages, ha ha ha, isn't it cute? Like, you know, he really likes this girl. It's a lot less funny when it's, you know, the creepy police officer who got your phone number off of a witness statement and won't leave you alone. When it's an abusive partner, when it's, you know, when it's, when it's, when it's, when it's.

So I watched that and I was like, yeah, this is a really good idea for an episode. Because how we think about technologies and these technologies, even from before they really existed, I think has shaped a lot of how we use and deploy these technologies and seek out these technologies, particularly with quote unquote futuristic technologies like facial recognition, where, you know, it's a very contrived and lazy plot point now in TV, in big blockbuster movies. It's like, ah, but we deployed facial recognition.

It's like, OK, that's so interesting that you deployed facial recognition. None of it's specific, right? None of it involves the statistical kind of, oh no…

Gus

The error rates 

Caitlin

The error rates that you're willing to accept.

So how specific statistically you set the system up to be, the likelihood of errors, the percentage match that the system is kind of surfacing. No, no, no. We found the one guy is always the right guy and we found him, you know, in a specific place at a specific time right now, which is a system that people want to exist but doesn't exist, but it's often presented in movies as if you had facial recognition, this is how it would work.

And I think that has captured the public imagination around that technology, around facial recognition such that when you say it, that's what people are thinking. They're not thinking what we have, which is a different thing. So, yeah, so that's why I was like, I think this is a really good idea for an episode, Gus.

Gus

Yeah, and I like what you said about the Spider-Man movie you did see. My take's just slightly different based on the Spider-Man movie I saw, which is the most recent one, because what I find is that technology in storytelling is sometimes a cheap hack and it's an unfair way to tell a story. Going back to Caitlin's examples of the police using facial recognition, it's whenever you watch a cop drama or a cop movie and they've run out of ways to keep the bad guy away from the good guy, they say, oh, we got a phone and we searched the phone and we found what we needed or the text message, we intercepted the text messages or we found the GPS location.

All of a sudden the story is just about over because that's what the budget permitted for how much time there was left in the episode or in the movie. And what I got annoyed with watching this Spider-Man movie, which I love, again, I love the franchise, so I'm not trying to be mean, but it's just: Spider-Man's a hero who depends on anonymity, wears a fricking mask. And in so much of the movie, he takes off his mask and he's hovering above buildings and he's feeling sad and all that.

And we want to see Tom Holland's face, and we want to see him because he's good to look at and he's an expressive actor and it's annoying when all you're seeing is the same old mask. But then the cheeky bastard has facial recognition deployed all across New York and he's able to find the bad person in a flash because he's got this surveillance network. And it's like, why is it only you have this surveillance network and the cops don't and the baddies don't and particularly the baddies, why don't they have it?

And that's when at the same time as I was watching this movie, a friend had sent me this article in Aeon, the online magazine, which was about how tech bros have basically taken science fiction and fantasy writing and owned it and are building this future based on the version of that they read. And the most obvious one is Lord of the Rings and Palantir or Lord of the Rings and Anduril or Lord of the Rings and some other stupid company name that they stole from this wonderful piece of fiction about good and evil and the challenges and the temptations that come with evil. And how to be good, you almost have to resist power.

Instead, these f**kers decide to come along and build companies that accumulate power and they pretend they're on the side of the good guys, which happened to be the West, of course. And so, this article in the Spider-Man movie happened the same time for me. And it's like, OK, well, there's cheap plot lines, but there's also let's not short circuit how hard this technology actually is just in order to have a fast denouement.

And let's actually look at the role that technology plays in these movies and the way they tell stories. And is it interesting? Is it realistic or is it just shoddy?

And the last example I'll use before we go through our list of movies is I did, like many people, I spent 2026 gorging on Stranger Things, the Netflix TV show that went over four series. And what was exceptional about Stranger Things was first it was based in the 1980s. So, before a mobile phone could short circuit a whole two hour movie be reduced to one phone call, there were no telephones in that regard.

So it was easier to tell a story. And in that environment, imagination and time takes place differently. But for what it's worth, if you've seen Stranger Things, you know that the characters use technology extensively.

They use ham radios, they use walkie talkies, they use all these forms of technologies to communicate and to move the story along. And at no point was it unrealistic because none of us would buy it because we, well, I lived through that era and we know that there's no GPS tag in a walkie talkie. And so you kind of have to do something better than just say, oh, I found the location of the baddie.

And that was beautiful. How do we do things now? It's not so beautiful.

And I thought, OK, well, let's look at the top movies and ask, is it a good or bad tech story? Is tech a crutch or does it actually help the story? And when they do use the tech, is it in an immoral or preachy way?

Because they can be preachy as well. Yeah. So we thought, OK, let's see if we can do this with the movies that are on this list.

Caitlin

Well, I think you have raised a really good point, which is that Spider-Man relies on anonymity and we broadly are supposed to like Spider-Man. And there's a concept in media analysis or at least on media analysis on Tumblr, which I appreciate is not an academic arena, but it's Watsonian kind of which is in universe explanations and analysis. And then there's Doylist, which is out universe like reality explanations and analysis.

And in universe, Spider-Man is the good guy. We are supposed to root for Spider-Man. We believe in him.

We like him. We support him being a good guy. And you're right that he is only able to do that with anonymity.

And so theoretically, anonymity is also great. It's important. It's vital to this thing that we appreciate and are supposed to enjoy and want to happen. How facial recognition fits into that makes no sense.

Gus

Yeah, no sense.

Caitlin

And why it would be acceptable to spy on everyone all the time, because he's a good guy. We know him. He is like 19 and, you know, really responsible.

Makes no sense.

Gus

And only because Tony Stark, like this is Iron Man, who has inspired a whole generation of defence tech companies. There's even a defence tech company called Stark, I's a German based company, that Tony Stark gave the teenager all this technology.

And that's why it's no longer Spider-Man. Spider-Man plus there's reams of technology and AI that he can engage with to do all these. And again, it's just it's hackery.

It takes like the story of Spider-Man. It's always like he's an awkward teenager that nobody knows and nobody likes. Even the people who love him as Spider-Man don't like him in real life and they don't realise, you know, the two don't cross.

And he's always supposed to be this awkward kid. But here's this awkward kid with a citywide surveillance system at his fingertips. Yeah, it just it was unnecessary.

But this is what modern story... this is what Marvel storytelling has become because of the Iron Man hero, the technologically enabled hero concept that seems to be taking over now in a way that wasn't necessarily the case before.

Caitlin

Have you heard the meme, you know, famous novel The Torment Nexus from like the 80s sci-fi? It's like great news. I've invented the Torment Nexus from the great, you know, old sci-fi book: Do not invent the Torment Nexus. No, but I think it is face recognition in particular that is the worst offender for this. Like it's true a little bit of communication surveillance.

It's true a little bit of, you know, like satellite phone interception nonsense. But facial recognition is particularly prevalent and particularly bad for this and particularly obvious as a shortcut for just going. We don't know how to get from A to B, but insert facial recognition that will explain everything.

And I think that was kind of not great, but it kind of worked when it didn't exist. Now that it exists and it is a real thing. If your show or your film is set now, not in the future, but now it does exist, but it exists in a kind of different and specific way than the sci-fi way.

If your show is set in the future, maybe a facial recognition system that works perfectly is really interesting to explore. But often these movies aren't really interested in technology. They're interested in getting from A to B really quickly.

Gus

That's exactly right. And if you're creating a movie about the future that has perfect facial recognition, then your story is going to be over very quickly. It's hard to have a hero and anti-hero if everybody's knowable and their locations are known at all times, whether that's a romance, because you could just always know where the person you fancy is and so the mystery is over. It's a murder mystery because you know who did it because there's footage right there and then. And everybody's it just that's why it's always introduced in the last 10 minutes of a cop TV show.

It's like, OK, we got the data because we need to wind up the story. Yeah. Tech destroys storytelling unless you do it very, very carefully.

[Music break]

Caitlin

Yeah. If we skip to Coyote vs. Acme, one of the things I think is so interesting about it, and it's really worth watching and we try not to spoil it because it's still in cinemas when we're recording this.

So it's well worth watching if you get the opportunity.

Gus

Thank God it's in cinemas.

Caitlin

Yes. But what's interesting about it is how little it cares about the legal system. Like the central premise is that the Wile E. Coyote from the Looney Tunes cartoons is suing the Acme Corporation for all its defective products that have brutally injured him many occasions as he tries to go after the Roadrunner, which is his kind of Sisyphean story. He's always trying to get the Roadrunner and he never does. That isn't a spoiler. That's like 50 years of cartoons. 

But the movie goes, OK, great, we're suing the Acme Corporation. It is not interested in how that process works.

It's not really interested in how that would look in a court case. It then isn't really that interested in congressional hearings, and nor is it interested in the mechanics of anything like a class action. Like this is not a legal thriller.

It's kind of a thriller, like it's a good movie, but it is not a legal thriller in a way that, again, I think is so interesting because so much was set up for like a courtroom drama, at least in the advertising, I think. And it is just if you are hoping to learn anything about that process, this is not the movie for you, which I thought was particularly interesting because in universe, in the movie, the Acme Corporation seems to be a monopoly on all technology. 

So they make these cartoon technologies, but they also make basically every handheld device you see in this movie, the phones, the tablets, everything, the cars they seem to largely make or like lots of car brands exist, but doesn't mention they're making cars.

They make military jets, they make military weapons, like everything they seemingly make, which means throughout the movie, as they're suing them, they're still using loads of Acme devices because there seems to be no other option. You know, at one point they're using an Acme phone to investigate Acme and one of the characters goes, you know, they're always listening on that, never gets mentioned again. 

And in fact, the only I think the only instance of confidence is someone listening in on a conversation, like using a microphone connected to a car radio, which again, I thought was really interesting because you've got all this potential of this technological monopoly, which seemingly is doing a huge amount of surveillance and data exploitation, but it's not really interested in that either.

And it comes, you know, unintentionally because this is a movie that was supposed to be binned for tax reasons and eventually made its way out into the world and into cinemas really despite the studio rather than because of it. So it's come at a kind of really interesting moment in product law in the US unintentionally whereby Meta are being sued or have been sued and have lost several times for making defective products. And if you've seen the movie, interestingly, it was two juries, one in New Mexico and one in Los Angeles, that said you should be held liable for these products being defective. And they've gotten some huge fines. They've made some concessions about potential safety things that they intend to kind of introduce because of this. 

And that is like if you remember the cartoons, despite the fact they never, never, never, never work, the coyote always uses Acme technology to try and create these [unintelligible – even I the person who was speaking has no clue what this word was].

And there are implications in the movie that he has some kind of like addictive relationship with this technology, that he does have no other options, that there is a very limited world outside of the Acme corporation. And the movie relies on things like a whistleblower who comes out really early and then doesn't really get heard until another whistleblower brings the things to light, which are really vital despite the fact that like the more you think about the possibility of whistleblowers in that context and like the ability of them to get their message out without being found out is actually theoretically very, very limited.

And the more you think about it, it's one of those movies, the more interesting it is. But also the longer you go into the movie, the less interested the movie is in anything specific to like the real world and the legal system, unless you're willing to accept that there is a different body of law and a different like legal situation and that cartoons are second class citizens and potentially a subcategory of person rather than like persons enjoying the full respect of the law, which again is really interesting.

There's so much that's interesting in this universe that it's like almost disappointing that it's only a movie. It's so… it's honestly really good. And then there's a little bit about kind of what is acceptable direct action, which I think is also very funny.

And there are loads of little jokes, which like I just personally really enjoy. There's a very funny printer joke, which is everyone knows listening to this. Printers are the most evil of all technologies.

And it's very funny. And I think the cartoon product is a real world analogous to like frivolous technologies that do real damage, you know, like social medias or data intensive technologies that seem fun and silly and frivolous, but actually are doing real harm is also really an interesting real life kind of analogous thing because they're going, oh, you know, it's just cartoons. It's just cartoon harm.

Cartoon harm isn't real harm. And I thought that was really interesting.

Gus

The perfect link to that is Toy Story 5 because it does so much of the same. 

[music break]

I could talk at length at how much I love the Toy Story franchise. And when it comes to like surveillance films, if somebody ever asked me, what's your favourite surveillance film?

It's not going to be 1984 or anything deep and dystopic. It's going to be Toy Story 3 because in Toy Story 3, it's such an old movie. It's OK to have a bit of a spoiler.

The toys are trying to escape from a daycare. And there's surveillance everywhere, but surveillance by other toys. And it's just it's the perfect heist film that is fully aware of the role of surveillance.

And in the Toy Story universe of where toys come alive when there are no humans around. It's also this wonderful thing where the surveillance by humans essentially renders toys inert. But when there's no surveillance, these toys are alive and enjoying each other's time and space and always caring for their kid. And it's just this beautiful thing. 

But Toy Story 5, I wasn't counting on it being as phenomenal as it was. It's not the best of this year's.

I still think number three is the best. But it was awesome because it dealt with all the things that you talked about in Coyote vs. Acme, which is what is it to be a child now?

And the big baddie that's introduced in Toy Story 5 is the tablet. It's a tablet device given to a kid because the kid couldn't make friends with toys. And so they thought, oh, let's get our daughter a tablet and she can play games there in community with others.

And so, it's not that the tablet was evil. It was that social layer. It was essentially an attack on social media for kids.

And so, then there's this recognition by every character that that's destroying friendship, it's destroying the relationship between kids. But as much as it's about that, the mechanics of it is that these toys are fighting against other toys and they're learning to cooperate with other toys. There's a generation of toys that are like Internet of Things version 1.0, where it's the Internet connection is not as good as the tablet connection and the way that these toys have to communicate differently as a result. 

It is so realistic, like all the technology and all the toys are true to their limitations, which is just extraordinary with one sole exception, which is if you ever seen any of the Toy Story movies, there's a character called Buzz Lightyear. He's an astronaut-ish from somewhere else, some other galaxy. And he's phenomenal. He's a, he's a hero. He's a Marine essentially. But of course, technology has to keep on evolving.

And in this version, he has drone capabilities and networking capabilities and the networking capabilities I'll leave alone, but the drone capabilities are just, they were unnecessary because I just said the movie is hyper-realistic within the realm of imagination of how all these toys would behave with the sole exception that none of them ever consume food. So, I don't know how they move around, but fine. That's okay. Cause they're toys. 

But Buzz Lightyear drone version can fly indefinitely as a drone. And it's like, where's the battery life in all of this?

It's kind of like when we get back to the Spider-Man idea of like: Oh, I'm going to put on these super cool glasses that let me see things. If there was a battery attached to those glasses, you would need superpowers in order to keep that in your head without crushing your whole body. How did Buzz Lightyear fly around as a drone if there was no battery attached to him?

And so, yeah, that's where the whole Toy Story movie fell apart. But no, it was fantastic. And I even got to say, actually, there's even agentic AI in Toy Story 5.

And this is, you know, they must've created this movie a year ago and it's fun. There's yeah. Hyper-realistic with the exception of drones.

Caitlin

That's fascinating.

Gus

Oh, and it's got Conan O'Brien in it too. And the wonderful Joan Cusack.

Caitlin

So I haven't seen a Toy Story movie since Toy Story 3, which is the last Toy Story movie I watched. And I had never thought about it in terms of the dichotomy between being watched and inert and being unwatched and like a full personality able to express yourself in the full range of possibility. That's really intriguing.

I just never thought about that. 

Here's what I think having not seen the movie, but I think you're right, which is that there are a lot of really serious and important movies about surveillance. Many of them are very good and they're very worthy. Which isn't always the same thing as good. And they're not necessarily a lot of fun to watch for all that many are very well made, and I think that if you limit your interest in this stuff to very well made, serious movies that like explore in great depth, our issues. Then a) Your media diet is going to be very niche and very specific and B) You're not going to have a lot of fun.

Whereas these movies are fun and they're really enjoyable to watch. And I think that they don't control the Overton window. And I think Toy Story is an interesting question of, are they reflecting modern anxieties, driving modern anxieties or both?

Because I think that Toy Story wouldn't have made a movie saying, you know, is social media bad for us as social humans without the current moment that exists in the world. And I don't necessarily think that people will, well, I haven't seen it made. Do you think people will watch it and walk away even more freaked out about social media than they currently are?

Or do you think they'll go, yeah, I agree with that.

Gus

The ultimate moral of the story is friendship matters and friendship, true friendship takes place in a special plane and that special plane may be technology supported, may not be technology supported, but it's a special plane. And we should do everything we can to find that and sustain it. And that's gorgeous, you know?

And so that's, again, it's not preachy, it's not overly moralistic. It just tries to say that kids are beautiful when they're being kids and toys are a beautiful tool for that. And perhaps technology can be that, but it would take a hell of a lot of work to make sure that it does not become corrosive and a bullying environment, which the playground can also be or in Toy Story 3, other toys.

I'm sorry. I just love that movie.

Caitlin

I think it's hard to suggest that like what drives technology to be good or bad aren't also partially reflections of just people and people can also be horrendous if you put them in a room together versus if you put them in two separate rooms and allow them to only speak technologically. But speaking of connection, do you want to talk about One Night Only?

Gus

Oh God. 

[music break]

This is one that you went on a mission on your own. So I have to count on your version of this.

Caitlin

So, I read all the think pieces. If you haven't read all the think pieces about One Night Only, the short description of it that I think is pretty accurate which is: rom-com sex purge dystopia. Which is to say it's a rom-com, it's quite sweet, it's quite funny, it's like a b-movie. Not many of those movies get made anymore, they're really like streaming-y, they're not huge budgets and it's like a fun… it should be a fun flirty little rom-com-y early 2000s movie. And there are aspects of it I really enjoyed. 

I really expected to watch this movie, the premise of which is that three years ago - and it's important you remember this was only three years ago, this has been happening for three years and both the main characters are adults, they've been adults for a while, like these are not young people. You know I think they're supposed to be probably I would guess 30s and so they've been adults for a while. So this this thing came in three years ago. 

The US Congress passed a mandate, it's called the mandate throughout the whole movie, which says that only married adults can have sex except for one night from 7pm to 7am - which means the government has defined what the night is which is also quite funny to me - at which point all single people are allowed to have sex and then they have to wait another year for the night the mandate allows them to have sex. 

They have, embedded in their wrists, biosensors which turn green on “the night” or presumably when they get married to indicate that they're allowed to have sex and they turn red again when they're no longer allowed to have sex. 

They all got three weeks to pick the design of their choice so they got some time to think about what meant a lot to them that they wanted embedded in their wrist as a biosensor.

It's this fascinating aspect where like 50% of the movie they are genuinely quite interested in the concept of this dystopia and 50% the movie is wildly uninterested in the concept of this dystopia, which is a dystopia. And they've got all these weird little jokes kind of in it, like Flavor Flav is doing a countdown to the beginning of the sex purge, they've got government sponsored countdowns it's like tracking the amount of time left in the sex purge like on top of taxis, and other things. 

Condoms are mandatory. So a big driving aspect of this movie is trying to get their hands on a condom, which they legally must have in order to have sex. The biosensors work, according to the movie - which decided to explain this rather than kind of nodding and going yes biosensors they decided to explain it which I think makes it extra funny because it introduces this aspect for you to interrogate - so it's based on hormones. If you have an increased - I think it's… I’m gonna say OxyContin but I think that's the drug… but whichever hormones 

Gus

Oxytocin

Caitlin

Thank you! Yes! Oxytocin and Dopamine. 

If you have increased Oxytocin and Dopamine, at the same time in the same place as someone else's biosensor detects increased Oxytocin and Dopamine then via 5G, which again they specifically mention, Oh No! The police get notified, which oh no a seems like nonsense. That's nonsense.

At one point someone who works for the company that made it says his startup is working on the ability to mask increased dopamine which one of the characters says: wouldn't that help cure Parkinson's? And the guy goes: I don't care there's no money in curing Parkinson's, which again did not need to be in the movie but they decided to put in. 

Questions I still have: 

• Married people: like are their sensors matched or can they have sex with anyone? Can they only have sex with anyone during the sex purge? Or can they have sex with anyone at any time? There is clearly some people within the context of the movie who have gotten married solely to have sex. Again, unclear if with everyone who's married or with only other married people. 
• Unclear how the biosensors tell if you're using condoms. But people are clearly being arrested on this basis because at one point a very old man, because they're in a police station, a very old man goes past and says the government will never convince them to wear a “love glove”. Which is horrendous. 
• People on parole aren't allowed to participate in the sex purge, because one guy is on parole for various offences including but not limited to violating the mandate 14 times in 8 days, which one of the characters that is told this is genuinely shocked by? Which I think is so funny, because again the mandate has only been in place for three years. 

Her sensor gets checked to see if it's still like live and working, but the data centre is really busy so it's going to take a little while? Like it's so strange. 

And I counted because thought it was bizarre, but there was 1 protest sticker, 2 repeal signs, 2 pieces of repeal graffiti, 1 protest show at radio city - like protesting the mandate - and 1 tiny little flag in someone's house. So like people are kind of largely on board with the sex purge, except the implication that all the gays are having illegal sex. 

Gus

Oh no.

Caitlin

So, the main character has like a gay bestie roommate who can't participate in the sex purge because their neighbour's babysitter fell through and she was offered $5,000 to babysit this 12-year-old for the night so that the neighbour could participate in the sex purge. To which she said yes and her friend goes: Oh you know do you want me to stay and you can go out and participate in the sex purge? And she goes: No, no, the queer community have been getting around your sex bans for like decades???

And it's like what are you talking about? What? So the queer community has, en masse, worked out how to hack their biosensors but they've not shared this information with anyone. It's a secret. Even with their best friends they live with, it's a secret known only to the gays. 

There is one brief argument between Molly Ringwald and Levar Burton about how it got passed. 

Gus

Like the real actors?

Caitlin

No, no, they're playing characters, but I just thought it was crazy that it was Molly Ringwald and Levar Burton. 

Gus

Yeah, absolutely I’m a huge fan of both of them. 

Caitlin

There’s in universe mentions of how it's affected the economics, because at one point a guy goes to get a haircut ahead of the sex purge and there are $165 buzz cuts, because it's price gouging ahead of the sex purge. There's price gouging for the one condom left during the sex purge. 

It has one of the funniest lines in any movie I've ever heard which is: The Government mandated sexual climate is hard to navigate! Which… I imagine it would be.

It's just so incoherent and fascinating. There's an implication that the like geopolitics are quite different, because at one point you're watching an interview with a congressman on a Chinese news channel, which they are in a Chinese restaurant but I think it's quite unusual for like fully Chinese language news, uh or is it the English language? But like it's a Chinese news channel and then another point they've got Saudi Arabian camel racing on the telly, which again I would imagine is quite unusual in American bars. 

And it's all just extraordinarily strange. And at one point there are posters in the police station about what is acceptable and what is unacceptable - so what is a legal act or what is an illegal act - which are a little bit like they're what you imagine. Basically, they're little cartoons but stripping seems to be legal. Which… How do you measure the difference in hormones with something like that versus like something like sex?

Everything about it is genuinely so fascinating but the movie's like: but look at this couple! Oh they're having such difficulties finding a condom! Oh no her partner's been arrested! Ha ha ha ha!

It's so strange and like the implication is that it's driven by a Christian kind of evangelical ideology. Except I’m not sure there is any Christian evangelical ideology that would allow for a sex purge and wouldn't clamp down on things like gay sex. Because theoretically you've got a biosensor it can magically do all this stuff using, you know, the very very scary 5G but they don't care about gay sex. Or, they do care about it, but the gays have worked out a way around it and everyone is fine with that. That doesn't seem to matter.

Everything about this movie is honestly so fascinating. Very little sex happens in it as well. 

The only other three things that I desperately wanted to mention, because I think it's so funny one is that well… a little bit of spoiler…

*** Spoiler begins

But, right at the end they're like we're not going to have sex. We've got 10 minutes of the mandate left, but we're not going to have sex because we don't want the mandate to control our relationship. And it's like the mandate is controlling your relationship, whether you do or don't have sex. So like “we're going to wait another year” it's like that's the mandate controlling your relationship, like that's what that is this!

*** Spoiler Ends

This is not relevant but one of the characters seemingly only financial… like how she's supporting herself in New York City is: she sings covers of popular songs advertising drugs so you've got the Eye of the Tiger, which she sings to advertisers psoriasis drug and there are a couple of other ones that come up. She seems to be supporting herself entirely based on this which is very funny and very strange. 

The other one is that there is a scene where she's riding around on a motorbike with no protective gear with this guy that, you know, she's interested in enjoying her evening with. And as a complete side note it's wildly irrelevant but if someone suggests you get on their motorcycle in a very short dress then tell that person they don't respect you and walk away. If they're not offering you a helmet, if they're not offering you like proper protective clothing, they're not interested in your health and safety and you should walk away from that person.

Gus

All the gear all the time! 

Caitlin

Yes, exactly! One hundred percent! I was watching it and she was like, you know this guy has real potential and I was like: he's not giving you a motorcycle helmet! As an absolute minimum, you're wearing high heels and almost nothing the rest of you, if there is an accident the best case scenario is you die. The other case scenario is you lose basically all of your skin! 

So, that was a side note and the other one is uh at one point someone says thanks Obama and another character points out this only happened three years ago and then she says something wildly incoherent that's just like: oh you know the pendulum. 

[Hysterical laughter]

It was honestly like genuinely kind of worth watching but I watched it and then not soon after I watched coyote versus acme and one is a well-made movie and the other one is not and it's so interesting seeing the difference between like a coherent well-made movie that isn't interested in exploring some of the things that I was interested in it exploring but like does what it set out to do and this other one which is just a total mess, which I genuinely enjoyed but I enjoyed in the way that you enjoy like a b-movie that promises so much and delivers so little. It's really it's kind of worth watching but also not worth watching.

Gus

I get it because like the amount of effort that has to go into building that universe for a relatively simplistic story oh that's exhausting

Caitlin

I’m so fascinated by during the sex purge, are other laws also lifted? Because there seems to be very little by way of enforced like public decency laws. They only mention the mandate being lifted but like, there are definitely some things happening that would normally get you arrested. 

But, at the same time, so the streets are really busy the whole time but they tell you - they don't show you, they tell you - that they're not. Everyone is at home having sex except for all the people you see out and about looking for sex or you know enjoying themselves, and all of the adverts and movies are filming this night because you know no one's out and about, it's really easy. Except - there are loads of people out and about they even this minor in-universe detail is just wildly inconsistent because there are loads of people out and about. It would not be convenient to film movies because there are people everywhere even if they you know like many people are theoretically at home. It's really strange. It's really really really really really really strange and really fascinating. 

But the movie is not interested in the things that are strange and fascinating except for the like tiny little bit maybe it's like one writer in a writer's room everyone else is going how can we introduce this cute situation with these you know fun flirty leads? Like how will they find the way back to each other? And this other guy’s: going yeah but why are the government sponsoring the timers? You know? Like they're buying advertising space on taxis and I think that the government should sponsor the timers so everyone knows how long it's legal! And everyone's going: yeah, yeah, we'll include that that's fine, that's fine, but like what if they drop a condom down a grate? 

It's so weird. It's genuinely one of the strangest movies I’ve seen in a really long and again kind of worth watching, but in like this is a movie set up for really good fan fiction like it's a jumping off point you know for a much more interesting universe…

Gus

Yeah

Caitlin

…that people with a lot more time they're gonna pour some time into but it's not the writers of this movie you know I think we could pick basically any other movie from the list to jump to because it will be a quality jump.

Gus

With the point you're raising about a universe that is built and what you do with it next. I think it's worth mentioning together two movies I wish I didn't have to have watched even though I love the premises of both of them, being: Super Mario Galaxy and Minions and Monsters.

Super Mario Galaxy. I'm a big Mario fan you know I would say, instead of going to watch this movie which fortunately I was able to watch on an aeroplane for free, I would suggest you go and buy Mario Kart 8 because it is freaking awesome.

But this movie is just they know that they have a universe they know they have all these characters you know and love, but it is just a mess - an absolute mess. So, I think we can kind of drive right by Super Mario Galaxy other than to say this this one little factor I find fascinating is: the big baddie is, again, Bowser - this giant turtle who has a kid. it's his kid is the big baddie and his kid's a good hacker and he's able to hack a system called Bowser OS, which again kind of like in Toy Story generates a shell script and you're able to see the login and green text. It's always green text. And he runs a programme and then you realise the programme he's running is actually all the Mario games. 

Caitlin

Oh! 

Gus

And he calls it a security system.

Caitlin

Oh?!

Gus

So, when you play the Mario games and you're jumping over things and there's flames coming at you, it isn't just some challenge for you - it is a security system protecting a planet that you are circumventing. That's not what I played Mario for. But I don't even know what I was thinking when I was playing Mario. Why am I jumping over this turtle? Why am I trying to climb up and get this flag? Lo and behold you're actually trying to circumvent a surveillance system. 

Anyways so that's Super Mario.

Minions and Monsters. Like when I did my research on this movie, and all the reviews from all the Hollywood trade press was very positive, and it's like okay let me watch this movie and it was horrible. It was like again, I love all movies and I love the Minions. I don't know if you know the Minions, but like they were a sub-character of a movie …

Caitlin

You forgot what it's called?

Gus

The name of the original…

Caitlin

Despicable Me

Gus

That’s it Despicable Me. Awesome movie. And these Minions are these little yellow characters, who their mission in life is to always serve the best evil actor there is. Best evil entity on the planet.

Caitlin

The most evil or the best evil?

Gus

The most evil.

Caitlin

Uh-huh.

Gus

And so when they venture through history you see them working for people they really shouldn't be working for. But there's this great on the internet there's this great discussion because in one of the Minion movies they go to sleep in the 1920s and wake up in some time in the 1960s and the theory was they had to go to sleep because if they did not they would essentially have helped Hitler. And, so then there's this movie: Minions and monsters, which again goes through vast periods of time but ends up in the 1920s and all I can think of is how is this movie going to end because Hitler is just like coming up and saying is this 1925? Is this 1927? Is this 1929? And when's it going to be, you know, the Beer Hall Putsch and all this episode? 

But it doesn't get there, because the story just falls apart and everything is a play within a play, within a play within a play and it's just like why did I watch this? But I understood why all the movie reviewers loved it is because it all takes place in Hollywood and it's actually a huge homage to all of the Hollywood dynamics of the 1920s. Like I think the Warner Brothers are characters within it for instance. And so I guess they loved seeing the story of their industry in a most ridiculous movie for characters that I absolutely love. So, it was a complete waste of time and because it's the 1920s tech didn't play or any role in fact nothing of any rational logic played any role in the entire movie so we could drive right by that one even though I spoke about it for a long time because I’mstill angry that I paid for it.

Caitlin

So, the Hitler theory I think is very funny and is an example of almost the opposite of one night only which is that it's a very funny premise that falls apart the minute you think about it too much. And, unfortunately, it made a lot of money and so they kept coming back to it. But the problem is it's a very funny premise that's, like, cute in a kid's context but the minute you think about it for five minutes… Evil's evil and I mean doubly unfortunately the holocaust, whilst extraordinarily evil, is not the only genocide that's ever existed in the world it certainly wasn't the first and, so yeah, exploring the life of the Minions who in theory have done some really horrendous stuff on their own stated like Watsonian premise is maybe not the best. 

Gus

But they're so cute - they're so cute! Let's make another movie, let's make another movie…Oh come on we have to stop. We have to stop with the Minions. 

Okay, other movies, because this was a huge year of movies - the movies we went to see included Odyssey, included Project Hail Mary, Back Rooms, Devil Wears Prada, and it just wasn't as much there. Like Project Hail Mary is one of the best movies of the year, if not of the decade so far, it's just such a phenomenal movie. And I love the technology, and the way I love rockets, I love the constraints communications, I love everything. I love the use of LLM in order for two civilisations to communicate with each other and how the modern apple watch would actually have enabled the creation of this LLM. It's fantastic. But yeah. there's nothing negative to say or even interesting to explore around the dynamics of surveillance or dynamics of communications there because everything was so hyper realistic and so grounded. 

Caitlin

yeah like there's not much that's interesting for us about Project Hail Mary when it, once it gets to space, you know? Like in space there's a lot of technology it's not that relevant to us. It's an extraordinarily beautiful movie, but again like that's not that relevant to us. 

My understanding is the book has a little bit more substance when it comes to the on earth, politics and there's something that I think is really interesting which the movie doesn't go into which I think makes a lot of sense in the context of the story it's trying to tell ,around the global cooperation on earth to achieve…

Gus

Yeah just for context for people who haven't seen it this is a movie that it's about for some reason the sun is losing its ferocity, it's losing its energy, and they're trying to figure out how humanity can stop the sun from essentially burning out and as a result destroying earth and all life on earth.

Caitlin

And it follows like space, and the rescue mission, and the science ,but there's a lot of kind of implications, which I think get explored more in the book which I want to read but I haven't read yet around how do we allow as many people as possible on earth to survive to allow the time for the science to happen to save everyone? Given the sun is decreasing in power. Which yeah ,it sounds really fascinating there's like clearly stuff going on the background in that movie on earth that's really interesting, there's like global cooperation they have some kind of weird base at one point on a ship…

Gus

On an aircraft carrier, thank you. Like those things are expensive, and if you think if the world is worried about loss of resources those aircraft carriers are going to be used to go around and grab resources, not for a huge scientific mission in order to save humanity. One would dream of that being our future but I don't think that would be it. 

Caitlin

And there is something interesting there, but it's not really explored in the movie, neither of us have read the book yet. So you know, it's kind of by the by. 

The Oyssey is set in ancient Greek times, whilst there is some fascinating uses of technology in ancient Greek times, and indeed in the Odyssey - once you kind of dig into what the word technology means - but not really surveillance technology.

Gus

I would just say two things. The lighter one… Well three things. 

The lighter one is the movie, and the story would be over in a second if there was mobile phone technology, or even a functioning postal system. Second the movie's rendition of the infamous trojan horse is phenomenal, because it doesn't just paint the picture of the trojan horse and the horrible fight or tragedies that happen after that, it also paints what's it like to be inside the trojan horse? What's it like to be the person on the outside of the trojan horse offering the trojan horse? It's just, it's so… You know in our sector we, when we talk about trojans, it's this simple thing that just gets inside the gates and does horrible things. This movie just puts such a visceral reality to it.

 And the last thing is, this is getting a little nerdy, but the basis of Greek society according to this version of the story is that the reason you're nice to strangers is because you never know if that stranger is a god in disguise and will do horrible things to you, and so as a result, you're terribly kind and greeting to others? Which is a really paranoid society if you're afraid to say no to somebody even if they're abusing all your all your things, because they might be uber powerful and do horrible things to you as a result. I don't know and so the movie like somehow, with the basis of that of the society, is sad that that society is about to come to an end yeah but it's a beautiful movie and for the people who loved it: I'm on your side for the people who hated it I get it but it's a beautiful movie.

Caitlin

Which I think, yeah, unless you want to get deep into the Devil wears Prada 2, which again you saw it in an aeroplane. 

Gus

Yeah, that was an aeroplane consumption, and I'm one of those people on the aeroplane that you hate sitting beside because if you have something on your screen I'm looking at your screen too. So, technically, I saw this movie about three and a half times and I don't think I enjoyed it any time too much, but you know again I love all movies. It's not bad at all. It's just it's a good one to end on, because while we watched Back Rooms and a few other movies - they're again enjoyable but not particularly relevant because again Back Rooms is one of those examples of a movie that takes place in a different era before you have mobile phones and whatnot. 

But Devil wears Prada 2 occurs in our era and it was just funny how little technology there was. It's about the fashion industry but it… technology is in the background where technology is destroying the fashion media industry ,and it's destroying media as well. And so that's the storm in background all the characters are trying to navigate, using a surprisingly small amount of technology in their day-to-day. But the real titans in this movie are actually again tech bros, and it is interesting how we keep on coming back to the power of tech in a story or the power of the tech bro in a story and it does tell a very sad story about the role that money plays in our society. But also it finds a way to end on a happy note about the role that money plays in society I don't know it's just it's kind of sad it's just very sad. 

Caitlin

Yeah I think the first one had a plot line about advertising as well actually advertisers playing a role in some stuff.

[music break]

What's the long and short of it? Watch movies? Watch movies critically? It can kind of be interesting or fun to look at a movie and go: yeah but what are the characters think of this what implications would this have for this universe? And then what do the filmmakers think of it? I think a lot of filmmakers think of facial recognition as an easy escape button and one that's visually interesting. Actually we shouldn't underestimate, as you say with spider-man, part of what spider-man takes his mask off a lot it's not because it's sensible to do so, it's because you know it's hard to make a movie with a guy that doesn't have a face that can emote and cry and get beat up and look sad or look happy… 

Gus

Or relationships that take place over text messaging, is not as much fun to watch as people running around and talking way too much in order for the audience to understand what's going on. So yeah, that's exactly my takeaway which is it's a little less on the moralistic are they trying to sell us down a path of surveillance, so that's the future tech bros will build that world, because they're always going to take the worst elements of any story and try to make a billion or trillion off it. But it's more, I think because of the way that we, as in people who work in this field people ,who are listening to this podcast ,who care about the things that we care about - it just when you look at a story when you consume a story and you pay attention to how the storyteller treats technology, it tells a different story.

Caitlin

100% 

Gus

You see the story differently, and you see the care that the storyteller takes. I guess, in the example of One Night Only, the level of care they take in creating this really strange, dark, oppressive, liberatory, Thanks Obama, kind of world. Or the Toy Story kind of world, where they know it's not realistic that toys come to life, but there are boundaries and they explore those boundaries, and then they still tell the story nonetheless. 

And this is why again we're not going to advise you to watch 1984 or any other dystopic film in order to learn about things, we think that this is just part of daily life and it's part of daily storytelling, and to see these things and enjoy these things… And I'll go to the my final point which is as privacy advocates, we love cop dramas, we love spy movies, and like I can't wait to watch slow horses. Like we don't go into these things with these moralistic, oh I'm not going to watch something that's about our oppressive state oppressing people, because I disagree with that fundamentally: no I want to see what they're doing! And I might very well root for the baddies, because that's sometimes a little fun, you know! It’s… 

Caitlin

Oh yeah 

Gus

but not a cheap story a cheap story is never fun. 

Caitlin

I think there's a shorthand for some of the stuff called Copaganda. You know, it's like the Brooklyn 99s, it's the fun happy, you know, don't you want to get behind the good guys who are going after the bad guys kind of a thing. It doesn't mean don't watch it, you know? It just means this isn't reality.

Gus

I just binged on Brooklyn 99 again recently, love it! 

Caitlin

And the number of times the guys in Brooklyn 99 followed due process is almost never, you know? 

Gus

There's barely ever a lawyer… 

Caitlin

Barring, actually, one of the best episodes of Brooklyn 99 ever, it's a bottle episode they've got a guy in the interrogation room and they've only got him for x number of hours and it mentions the fact that American police are allowed to lie to you. That is they're allowed, you know all the precedent says they're allowed to lie to you .so that's something important to know. That in the show is presented slightly as a moral conundrum, but also slightly like is it legally permissible to do? Most of the time they don't really care! 

You know, once they introduce those boundaries it's really fascinating. Again, like you know, it's not always accurate or ethical but like it's fascinating! And I've always enjoyed the UK, kind of English, cosy crime, Agatha Christie investigation where they bring you all into a room and disregard any aspect of due process, or like, you know, any aspect of the actual like how you would secure a conviction following all this investigatory work. They're like: what if we just tell you exactly what happened and hope really hard you confess while we secretly… 

You know, ah it's so dumb, but it's really fun to watch. And it's kind of also fun to watch and think about like that aspect of it, when you're watching it and you're going: Aha! But that would not be admissible in court, because you have not followed any kind of chain of custody and there is no due process in this entire tv show. so the good news is you catch a lot of murders, and the bad news is none of them are in prison. It's all just interesting I think it all says something both about how people currently feel about things, where the kind of direction of things are going, you know, how they have felt about things. All of that is contained, I think in big blockbuster movies and it's fun and they're fun to watch and sometimes you just gotta have a little fun.

Gus

Exactly, exactly, exactly, couldn't have ended it better than that.

What I would say at PI we love movies we watch movies together we go and watch movies together we're toying with creating a movie club we're looking into it and if you have any suggestions of movies that you would like us to cover in some future edition, maybe not the top movies of the year type of thing, but movies of a certain genre, movies of a certain era, movies with a certain name. I don't know, there's all ways of cutting this one.

Caitlin

Yeah, movies you think are interesting in terms of tech or surveillance or privacy, movies you want to watch, movies you have watched, that you'd like to talk about or talk to other people about. Because, you know, we were thinking maybe a film club more in that kind of ilk of like discussion and kind of getting to chat more to you guys rather than chatting to each other because, you know, I like Gus but I don't like him that much. Then please let us know.

You can always email us at [email protected]. Yeah, and please do so. You never know, we might put the feedback form back up but it's not currently up at the moment.

So the most you can do is email us at [email protected].

[music break]

Gus

Well, thank you for listening to our summer project of watching movies through any means possible and enjoying movies as much as we could except for a couple of exceptions such as Super Mario. Do not go see Super Mario Galaxy. How did that thing make half a billion dollars?

Well, I know how it made half a billion dollars. There's a lot of unhappy parents. If you enjoyed listening to this, we will share the list of movies wherever you're listening but also on our website at: pvcy.org/TechPill.

We'll also include the link to the Aeon article about Tech Bros and how they have bastardised science fiction and fantasy in order to build their torment nexuses. You can sign up to be the first to learn more about this podcast and the work that we do at Privacy International by going to pvcy.org. Don't forget to rate and subscribe to this podcast on whichever platform you use.

The music is courtesy of Sepia. This podcast was produced by Max Burnell for Privacy International.