Let’s start by discussing the ethics behind electing World of Tomorrow 3: The Absent Destinations of David Prime (2020) for a movie column. I know that celebrating a 34-minute short goes against the very idea of a column that talks about all-things feature-length. Even if you were to compare it to Don Hertzfeldt’s other trio of shorts that made up the film It’s Such a Beautiful Day (2012), it feels off. Given that Indiewire critic David Ehrlich recently interviewed the filmmaker and he’s proposed many more shorts (given access to collaborators). Then again, Ehrlich is one of those people who is trying to legitimize shorts for end of year lists, so… I’ll take it. For this time only, I’ll be discussing why Hertzfeldt is one of my favorite artists.
In a lot of ways, I owe some of the existence of The Memory Tourist to this series. While I had an outline for what I wanted this website to be, I felt that I needed a name that would symbolize my ultimate goal with every essay that I published on here. As I wandered through everything, I eventually landed on World of Tomorrow 2: The Burden of Other People’s Dreams (2017) and was reminded of a small detail that stuck with me. With the series focusing on the emotional toll that memories have on us, there was something amusing about these people who time-traveled only to observe a moment, taking pictures of things both comic and macabre. Suddenly it clicked. As much as this is an ongoing website with an evolving narrative, I was treating everything from the perspective of a Memory Tourist.
Hertzfeldt’s now-trilogy focuses on a world that is equally complicated and simple. At the end of the day, each short focuses on the impact that memories have on Emily 9, a clone of Emily Prime who is introduced in World of Tomorrow (2015) as an infant. The dynamic of deep brooding alongside childlike wonder became one of Hertzfeldt’s most impressive protagonist in his entire career. Given that he’s someone who has been making stick figure shorts since the Mid-90s, it’s amazing to know that he’s still evolving, getting mileage out of a few lines conveying some of the darkest, loneliest narratives of his career.
For most people, this would be a novelty that people outgrow. After all, how many times can you make a short like Rejected (2000) (Oscar-nominated, mind you) where you witness some of the most horrifying abuse ever done to a series of lines? Hertzfeldt has evolved over the decades, giving us the manic-depression masterpiece It’s Such a Beautiful Day before shifting to World of Tomorrow which he made in part to understand how to use modern software. In my humble opinion, what he has created is some of indie animation’s greatest achievements, finding a maturity clashing with absurdism in ways that have always been prevalent in his work.
World of Tomorrow 3 feels like his epic, a magnum opus that pushes animation into new and majestic wonder. Not only that, but the complicated plot struck me differently each of the five times, moving from a sense that this was a depressing short where David Prime sacrificed his health and physical stability for the love of a girl he may never meet, to something more comic, finding a dark commentary on how romance creates obsession that makes us sacrifice our very being. We begin to wonder why David Prime is so obsessed with this futile task. Even with its sweet ending, you’re left wondering why this centuries-long, time travel tale full of allusions to David’s death (or “absent destination”) mattered. It does, in part, because we’re all fools when it comes to love.
David Prime gets the message when he is a baby, where Emily 9 is reading him a poem about finding a dead body. It follows with a discussion of David’s fear that he’ll drown before Emily 9 promises that the insects still struggling are alive. It could be alluding to a reason to live, or David Prime is best ignoring this like he does the other pop-up ads that cloud his sight. It’s clearly an obsession and one that makes him take on a futile task that has killed many like him (because they’re clones). Hertzfeldt is so obsessed with getting almost to the line of a breakthrough only to introduce a new hurdle, cutting transmissions short or removing basic functions because David Prime’s programming capabilities can’t process the data of Emily 9’s message.
I am in awe with World of Tomorrow 3 because it’s the first of this series to feel like it’s more than a 17-minute existential poem. While I am still partial to World of Tomorrow 2, World of Tomorrow 3 is a journey across literal space and time, introducing some hard sci-fi concepts that never outshine the emotional desperation of these characters. Its third act ties everything beautifully into the first two, never forgetting to include some tragicomic punishment for the characters. Everything that happens here exists for a chance meeting, and in it, Hertzfeldt lays out some crazy ideas that may catch viewers off-guard. Be thankful that your Vimeo rental lasts 72 hours because you’re going to want to watch it a few times to understand just what is going on.
If I can be transparent, while I love this trilogy, my familiarity with the first two at this time has dulled with time. I long to see them again, but I could only presume certain things when watching these familiar clips given a new context. Maybe Hertzfeldt has made the perfect Rubix cube. I want to believe so. Even then, I want to suggest that you’re not going to be lost if you randomly choose to start here. If anything, you’ll be able to comprehend David Prime’s story a whole lot clearer, understanding his uncertainty as something frustrating and hazy. With that said, you’re missing out on the series’ MVP Emily Prime, so you may want to go back afterward.
With all of that said, there is something to say about how he’s evolved since Lily and Jim (1997). It isn’t just his understanding of how relationships have this awkward compromise, but also that he seems infatuated with making a sci-fi world that blends artistic styles that are constantly at odds with each other. To watch David Prime use a computer is a magnificent example of the technique, finding screens bulging and reflecting off of each other. He makes it claustrophobic, mixing frayed, glitching images with gorgeous mountainous shots just a few hues off recognition. Even the way that David Prime falls to the ground only to push himself up has a fluidity that contradicts the living, breathing nature of the stick figures in close-ups, constantly flowing with a hand-drawn craft. It’s perfect for any small imperfection.
Not only that, but the sound design is its own experience. Everything about it feels harsh like you’re pricking your finger on electrocution. Nothing about the world makes sense in terms of sound. Emily 9’s transmission feels like it’s been processed through several echo chambers rigged with Tesla coils. David Prime’s computer has sound effects not out of place from some 90s processor. At times the background has an unease of queasy drones that throw the viewer off. At every turn, you’re left to wonder what this world is. Pause on any minute and you can see a half-dozen stories that could be expanded upon.
Hertzfeldt has created a world of endless possibilities, mixing animation with live-action backgrounds or primitive pencil sketching that makes you perplexed. Even the choice to add in score pieces from Chopin and Tchaikovsky only shows how eclectic everything is. Something this anarchic, constantly sounded like it’s on the verge of self-destructing, is given something so elegant underneath, creating a pulse by which the whole story needs to exist. It needs to break through the uncertain and find something pure underneath even if it’s through the eyes of amorous clones.
Most of all, Hertzfeldt understands how interpretive his stick figures have become. Don’t mistake this for laziness. Much like a stage production with minimalist dressing, a stick figure has little certainty in its performance. While David Prime may have bags under his eyes, his physicality wearing with age, there aren’t as many nods to tools we’d need to notice how he’s emoting. We’re just left with an abstract image that doesn’t fully make sense, to begin with. When placed in a landscape designed to continually frustrate, you understand implicitly how they’re feeling. If anything, it helps to say so much about each individual viewer.
With World of Tomorrow, Hertzfeldt got his second (unexpected) Oscar nomination, and it’s amazing to note that he’s only become more complex and ambitious since. While I think that the first two are more concise, reflecting something palpable and familiar even as a child conjures a baby dinosaur out of midair, World of Tomorrow 3 creates something more muddled, needing to be thought about for a few days before coming to a brilliant conclusion. You can get caught up in the literal ending of the short, but it’s nowhere near as rewarding as the journey, the impatient wait for any human satisfaction to be achieved. Even as the world has progressed at times past its usefulness, there is something human at the center, aching for one of the few things that technology could never reach. In some ways, it only prolongs and frustrates situations, taking us out of comfort and everyday social interaction.
I pray that World of Tomorrow 3 will get another Oscar nomination because I can’t imagine anyone coming up with something this curious. As a work of art, it’s constantly pushing boundaries that throw the viewer on edge while making them grapple with emotional discomfort. It’s able to comment on the struggles of memories to be anything vital and useful to the present. More than that, it’s one of the few times in 2020 that animation has felt exciting and new, not relying on bland conventions. Hertzfeldt is a master that I look forward to every time out and I am thankful that The Academy at least recognized that twice. Though honestly, if they ignore this one I’ll sick Godbaby on them (“a turtle goes on a rabbit!”).
What does it all mean? You’ll have to watch and find out. Even then, I don’t promise that the answer will be all that clear. Frankly, my first time watching it was such a whirlwind of surprise that I was left awestruck. How did he come up with any of that? It’s difficult to catch everything substantial on the first time around, and it’s only by the third or fourth time that I began to understand its mechanics, how a man banging a hammer on top of a Zorgbot was a brilliant sight-gag. It’s not only the story that will captivate you but every small detail (trust me, there are dozens of small gags hidden in the text).
I can only hope that Hertzfeldt eventually combines all of these World of Tomorrow shorts into a box set. Maybe there is an even greater narrative to come, elevating him further into the world of surrealist masters. For now, this is a great way of commenting on memory and death while getting a few delightful gallows humor punches in there. I wish there were more artists like Hertzfeldt, forcing the world to be a little weirder on the quest to make loneliness into a universal art form. If nothing else, it would make us all into people with a fun and weird sense of humor, deserving of each other.
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