Surface Levels

Research Background Anthropologist Anna Tsing considers telling stories of “promise and ruin” which end in decay as abandoning hope in a time of climate crisis, where to maintain hope she calls for attention to be drawn to “what’s left” in “damaged landscape[s]” (2015, 18). This debate is reflected in documentary media scholarship as Alexandra Juhasz and Alisa Lebow (2018) argue in their Beyond Story manifesto that documentary needs forms beyond story to engage with destabilising forces such as climate. My research asks how can attending to what remains elicit hope in a time of climate crisis? Research Contribution Surface Levels is a five-minute experimental documentary smartphone film shot at Menindee Lakes; a region marked by cycles of drought and flood, culminating in mass fish deaths linked to climate change (Murray Darling Basin Authority 2023). The film juxtaposes fast-paced close-ups of unnoticed details with locked-off long shots of the landscape’s broader beauty. Utilising the smartphone’s intimate and mobile affordances, the film crafts an ecocinema experience that “models patience and mindfulness–qualities crucial for…an ongoing commitment to the natural environment” (MacDonald, 2013, p. 19). Surface Levels evolves as an ecocinema smartphone film which, through its appreciation of, elicits hope for the environment in the face of climate crisis. Research Significance Surface Levels was commissioned by Australian Environments on Screen in partnership with the Mobile Innovation Network Association (MINA). Was screened at ACMI as part of the MINA XII film festival in 2023 and will be screened at the Australian Screen Production Education Research Association (ASPERA) conference in November, 2024.