Simon Sellars: Sleepy Brain Archives

by Rebecca Cannon

all images © 2003, Unsharp Mask LLC

Nothing So Strange is a new mockumentary about the assassination of Bill Gates. It’s also the first feature film to have its worldwide commercial debut on the internet. Footage from Nothing So Strange has been released as open source, and the film follows the efforts of the conspiracy/activist collective Citizens For Truth, who attempt to disclose the LAPD’s cover up of evidence associated with Gates’ assasination. Alek Hiddell, an African-American who was shot by the police moments after the assassination, is blamed for the killing, but evidence suggests he may be innocent. An attack on the LAPD’s real history of corruption is woven into the story, with footage of the Rodney King beating, and the recording of officer Mark Fuhrman stating “Niggers, they’re easy” supporting the narrative.

Rebecca Cannon enters this strange, alternate universe…
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The appeal of mockumentaries is the way in which they sabotage the notion that events conveyed in factual documentaries are authentic. The success to which the mockumentary makes a parody of real documentaries relies heavily on their degree of realism, thus at first glance the primary objective of a mockumentary might seem to be to convince the audience of the reality of the faux content. Mockumentary classics such as This Is Spinal Tap (Reiner, 1984) and Man Bites Dog (Bonzel & Poelvoorde,1993) thrill viewers with a keen reproduction of real life events, using reductive techniques such as DIY-quality footage to further enhance believability.

Brian Flemming, director, writer and editor of Nothing So Strange (and co-founder of Slumdance, an alternative to sundance film festival), shot his actors at real events, such as the 2000 Democratic National Convention, and also produced supportive websites like billgatesisdead.com, citizensfortruth.org and the Gates Memorial webring. Gates is played by Steve Sires , who is so realistic a lookalike that even Microsoft have hired him.

According to the Nothing So Strange website, “Nothing So Strange is an open-source film. While the filmmakers’ final cut of the movie is protected by an ‘all rights reserved’ copyright, the raw footage that makes up the film is not. All of the clips in this store are yours to use as you please (as long as you credit the source of the footage). You may copy them, share them and use them in your own creative projects, commercial or noncommercial”. Various films, documentaries and other AV media have been open source for some time via projects such as the open-source movie archive. But the inclusion of Bill Gates in the narrative does make an important statement with regards to Microsoft and their problematic relation to open-source content. On the one hand, Microsoft have tried to push the US government to legislate against open-source software, rightfully fearing potential revenue losses as open-source operating systems like Linux become the fastest growing platforms (Linux is expected to overtake apple in market percentile by 2004). On the other hand, in 2002 Gates claimed to be the father of the open-source movement, telling his shareholders that “the open-source movement wouldn’t have existed without Microsoft”.

“The reason you see open-source there at all,” Gates said, “is because we came in and said there should be a platform that’s identical with millions and millions of machines, and the BIOS of that should be open to everybody”. In reality, Microsoft set out to produce an operating system for the IBM PC – the openness of the BIOS would have been news to IBM lawyers who spent years sueing illegal clones.

However, Nothing So Strange places itself in a difficult position with regards to suspending our disbelief because the basic premise, that Gates is dead – even within the context of a mock-documentary – is without credibility. However, as Jane Roscoe points out, (author of Faking It – Mock-Documentary and the Subversion of Factuality) there are advantages to promoting a mockumentary as a work of fiction.

For example, Peter Jackson’s Forgotten Silver (Jackson) is a New Zealand film that caused an angry backlash in audiences the day after its debut screening. Although it was never specifically described as a factual film, Forgotten Silver was built up to be of national importance due to the long-lost NZ filmmaker Colin McKenzie, whose life and work it purported to uncover. After it was announced on national television to be a hoax, many people contacted the media to express their anger at being made fools of. Roscoe notes that the intention of a mockumentary “is not to make fun of the audience, but to let them in on the joke. The whole point of mock documentary is that the audience is a knowing audience, we take part in the jokes and go along for the ride.”

The joke, and the ride in Nothing So Strange, didn’t take me quite where I was expecting. As an open-source project I was hoping to see a film that attacked the monopolisation, censorship and legislation-control propagated by transnational corporations, perhaps using Microsoft as an example. Although these issues were mentioned in the film as reasons for a soon-to-surface class war, they were hardly the focus of attention. There was far more sympathy for Gates’ death than apathy or fervour.

Racism, police corruption, and the dysfunctional nature of activist organisations (and activists themselves) are the real focus of critique in Nothing So Strange. As the Citizens For Truth group continue their research to defend the accused assassin, they develop an increasing sense of self importance. Relations amongst the group members devolve as individual egos inflate. The climax of the film is particularly hilarious to anyone who has spent time in a left-wing, grassroots organisation. The special merging of reality and fantasy particular to the mockumentary genre does occur in Nothing So Strange, however it appears to do so more for the characters than the audience.

:: LINKS
Nothing So Strange
(Nothing So Strange can be downloaded in full for as little as $3USD (Quicktime movie), free from copy protection or limited-viewing disablers).