OPENS JUNE 17
About the Film
MSPIFF41 Official Selection
Written and directed by multidisciplinary artists Saul Williams and Anisia Uzeyman, the film tells the story of a cosmic romance between an intersex hacker and a coltan miner that seeds revolution. Executive Produced by Lin-Manuel Miranda and Stephen Hendel (Finding Fela) and Featuring All-Original Music by Saul Williams.
Multi-hyphenate, multidisciplinary artist Saul Williams brings his unique dynamism to this Afrofuturist vision, a sci-fi punk musical that’s a visually wondrous amalgamation of themes, ideas, and songs that Williams has explored in his work, notably his 2016 album MartyrLoserKing.
Co-directed with the Rwandan-born artist and cinematographer Anisia Uzeyman, the film takes place in the hilltops of Burundi, where a group of escaped coltan miners form an anti-colonialist computer hacker collective. From their camp in an otherworldly e-waste dump, they attempt a takeover of the authoritarian regime exploiting the region's natural resources – and its people. When an intersex runaway and an escaped coltan miner find each other through cosmic forces, their connection sparks glitches within the greater divine circuitry.
Set between states of being – past and present, dream and waking life, colonized and free, male and female, memory and prescience – Neptune Frost is an invigorating and empowering direct download to the cerebral cortex and a call to reclaim technology for progressive political ends.
Extraordinary foreign films, must-see American indies, and groundbreaking documentaries from around the world, screening weekly at MSP Film Society.