You ever have that thing where someone is telling you something and you find yourself leaning forward with a slick crook in your neck and a "wut?" expression on your face? In some cases this is because you cannot believe how stupid the person sounds, but this is not the case with this short film. Although it did all sound crazy to me, it is presented in such a straight fashion that while I was leaning forward with my "wut?" face on, I also was deeply engaged by the business, the ideas and the reality of doing this.
I appreciated this approach because this subject would almost have been too easy to deliver as a joke and I can picture Louis Theroux doing a film here where he asks the awkward questions and does his "innocent abroad" thing to make them look foolish as he feeds them the rope. Instead Kane and Koury play it straight and let the reality stand for itself – perhaps this is because they believe in the idea, but whatever the reason it works well for the benefit of the film. We see genuine people working there and we understand that ultimately the people undergoing the process and simply hoping that maybe they live a little longer in the future.
That said the film doesn't sugarcoat it and talk it up and indeed there is honesty in there about this not being a proved technology or anything of the kind, so it is again honest about the nature of it – although so are the people involved. I disagree with it myself and think it is nonsense but this didn't mean I was not fascinated by the film in terms of its structure and tone but also in terms of its rather morbid access to the facility and in particular a body being unloaded and installed for, I guess, forever. Whatever your view the film will work because although you will be in disbelief, you will still be engaged and interested and this is helped by the fact that the film plays it straight rather than going for the obvious route of "look at these nutjobs".
