VERDICT: Gerard Ortín Castellví’s film about the mechanised standardisation of plant products in an industrial greenhouse is both hypnotic and unsettling; meticulous documentary and dreamlike fantasy.
The produce of the natural world is subjected to the unflinching computerised eye of modern capitalism in Gerard Ortín Castellví’s fascinating new short film, Agrilogistics. Shot in a selection of vast greenhouses in the Netherlands, the film observes recently developed forms of assessment, data collection, and subsequent management that tulip bulbs, chrysanthemum stems, and vine tomatoes undergo to ensure homogenous saleable crops. This ranges from conveyor belts being scrutinized by high-definition cameras so that bulbs can be visually auto-assessed for selection by a robotic arm, to trundling Plantalyzers monitoring and controlling the growth of tomatoes.
The rigidity and repetition of these practices are captured in pristine and scrupulously framed images and gliding movements both in the frame and of the camera which, coupled with unhurried editing, create a sense of a smooth mechanical tempo. It’s a hypnotic experience, but one that is constantly undercut by the sense of unease, and even friction, generated by an inorganic regulation of natural processes. A significant shift in rhythm and aesthetic, which comes almost precisely at the film’s midpoint, is both unexpected and highly effective. Suddenly the daytime greenhouse of productivity is transformed into a fantastical nocturnal idyll in which animal intruders, plants, and machines interact in far more intuitive ways.
To some extent, it is as if the greenhouse becomes an analogue for the cinema. On one hand are the digital, formal elements of the production – all of the structure that exists behind the camera in service of the image – and on the other is the oneiric encounter with the film itself, intoxicating and in some way unknowable. As soft purple light filters through the otherwise dark greenhouse and the hard and fast borders between the natural and manmade worlds become less defined, Agrilogistics brims with the potential for alternative, hybrid futures.
Director, screenplay, producer, cinematography: Gerard Ortín Castellví
Editors:Maddi Barber, Mirari Echávarri, Gerard Ortín Castellví
Music: Rutger Reinders
Sound: Oriol Campi Solé
Venue: Berlin Film Festival (Berlinale Shorts)
No dialogue
21 minutes
