All Light, Everywhere

Can the act of seeing ever be removed from human biases? Did the invention and the subsequent ubiquity of the recorded image achieve this, or confirm it as impossible? Big questions fill Theo Anthony’s film, more essay than documentary, but thankfully they’re backed up by robust arguments and surgical filmmaking, and focused into an urgent modern topic: the intersection of state power and technology in police body cameras.

A wealth of philosophical statements are banded around the film, in cool, unfeeling voiceover as well as disconnected subtitles, but they never feel like platitudes. Rather, it feels like what we assume or take for granted about the act of seeing is being interrogated, presented in a detached, sterile way that contributes to a feeling of slight dread, either by lingering on unnerving perspectives and firing an onslaught of images and data at the audience.

Filmed at various points over the past decade, the private companies worming their way into law enforcement throw up as many red flags as the institutions that welcome them. In his exposé of the fallacy of objective recording, Anthony is keen to highlight his own inescapable, biased presence behind the camera, but the film would benefit from tackling the topic more effectively than the few evocative moments that go undiscussed. But these flaws feel like human errors in a complex film about that very topic. BE OBSESSED, a sign in a body-cam manufacturer threatens its workers. With regards to Anthony’s film, such an imperative is unnecessary.

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Released 22 Jul by ICA Cinema; certificate TBC