Analysis of an Advert: A Short Film for reMarkable — “Get Your Brain Back”
How & Why reMarkable made a short film about our relationship with Technology
Directed by Darren Price & Simon Robson, the opening of Get Your Brain Back is meant to grab your attention. But as it does this, it also succinctly encapsulates the message of the entire film.
We see a little girl sitting in the middle of a room, calm and seemingly innocent. As we move closer, a hand reaches out towards her. Once we get close, the girl suddenly transforms, suddenly sinister, showing glowing red eyes and a creepy grin.
While this scene presents a temper tantrum that many parents in the modern age have likely encountered, it is also meant to symbolize reMarkable’s view on our relationship with technology. At first approach, our relationship with technology seemed innocent. Only the benefits of technology were evident. But over time as we grew closer to technology, and it grew more ingrained in our lives, we began to notice the unintended negative side effects.
Get Your Brain Back is emotionally evocative, visually engaging, and is filled with interesting imagery. Unfortunately, in doing this it fails to make the product being sold seem appealing.
Get Your Brain Back shows us our world on technology. At the start of the film, we’re shown what appears to be a technology presentation. A man stands on a stage holding a glowing box in his hands. A crowd of people watches, their mouths agape with awe. The man holding the glowing box is wearing circular rimmed glasses and a black shirt with his sleeves rolled up.
These images are reminiscent of the unveiling of the first iPhone. This is a fitting place for the filmmakers to start their story. The release of the first iPhone and Apple products in general have played a significant part in both the benefits and drawbacks borne of technology’s proliferation and influence on our lives. As the film progresses, we are shown the story of our relationship with technology and how it has shaped us for better and for worse.
The film first presents the benefits, starting with the consolidation and increased efficiency which new technology has allowed. The film expresses this with a shot of a man knocking papers, pencils, books, and a calculator off of his desk. Now all of these things can be replaced with a computer, tablet, or phone. He can read, research, write, and calculate all from a single device.
Another image shows a man in a room typing away on a laptop, a cup of coffee at his side. His eyebrows are furrowed with concentration. He shouts with excitement as he finishes typing and lightning springs from his fingertips. This is meant to reference the speed and efficiency that modern tech has allowed.
The film also presents the ability to communicate and connect with family and friends over long distances. With the ability to fit a good quality camera with video chat capabilities in your pocket, it is easier than ever to connect with family and friends instantaneously.
It’s also easier to connect with the world than ever before. News, videos, and games are instantly at our fingertips. And with the rapid advancement of things like virtual reality technology, it’s becoming even easier. Virtual reality can be an educational tool allowing us to interact with information like never before.
Up until this point in the film, exclusively the positive aspects of our relationship with technology has been presented. But after this there is a shift in the film.
Near the one minute mark, the film begins to hint at the negative side effects of our technological interactions. We see a woman surrounded by people using their devices. We see people watching a live concert through their phones. We see a woman distracted by an alert. The full shift is indicated by a social media photo which seems innocent initially until a façade is dropped, revealing a low lit face with an ominous smile.
The first side effect the film presents is isolation. With so much at our fingertips, we are able to access more of the world but it has isolated some from the world around us. The film presents this idea with the image of a man surrounded by screens, all of which provide different information. As we move further from the man it is revealed that he is living in a bubble made from these screens. And as we move even further it is revealed that he is not the only one.
Another image we are presented with alludes to distracted driving. It is the image of a car that at first seems to be floating through the air. We are placed in the perspective of the vehicle’s driver. Various items are floating throughout the car and at the center of our gaze is a glowing screen. If you look just behind the screen you see a body of water growing ever closer. The image painted is of a potentially fatal accident caused by distracted driving, an unfortunate side effect of the growing entanglement of technology with every aspect of our lives.
The film next presents technological addiction. It presents this idea through pills designed to resemble emojis. These pills transform into wires which are linked directly into the brain of a woman at her computer.
Floating Robots surround the woman monitoring her, seeming to scan and probe her brain for further information. This is likely a reference to the way many online newspapers, games, and social media apps are designed with always consuming algorithms designed to ensure an individual spends as much time as possible using the site or app.
We are presented with the image of a child wanting to connect with whom we can assume is a parent. The parent ignores the child literally blocking him out with technology. This image presents the idea that technology addiction has become an impediment in our connections with families and friends. It also illustrates the idea that technology has made us less open to real-life connections.
The final images of the film present the issue of distraction. It uses the imagery of fragmentation as its core method of communicating this idea. The first use of this imagery involves a woman typing at a computer, on her desktop multiple windows open. Without warning, her head cracks breaking into more and more pieces. With this fragmentation comes new body parts. She grows extra eyes and extra mouths. This relates to how our focus has been divided in large part due to the one-two punch of technology and the internet. Extra eyes because we often look at multiple things at once rather than focusing on one, extra mouths because with email, texting, and social media we are often having multiple conversations at once.
This idea of fragmentation is also used with the imagery of a woman standing on a floating island. The island is slowly being broken into smaller pieces by sharks, made of alarms and notifications. This is alluding to how alerts and notifications can often break our focus.
After presenting the good and the bad sides of technology, the reMarkable tablet is presented. The ad states that this product has been made “in protest” of the ways technology is “modifying us”.
The ad clearly lays out how it thinks technology is modifying us for better and for worse. For the better:
- Modern technology has allowed the consolidation of various tools. With a single device a person can read, write, draw, calculate, and communicate.
- Technology has helped us work with more efficiency.
- A person is able to connect with friends and family over long distances. And more than a telephone, video chat enabled by compact and efficient technology allows an additional level of communication.
- Access to information is at a higher level than any other time in history. Access to the news and research is easier than ever.
For the worse:
- Isolation. Technology has made it easier for us to avoid interaction with the world around us.
- Distracted driving. A fatal and growing problem spawned by the use of and our dependence on modern technology.
- Addiction to technology is a problem and in large part, technology is designed to promote this.
- Disconnection with family and friends is caused by the impediment our addiction to technology causes.
- Technology has made us less focused in both our work and private life. Technology can act as a distraction shattering our focus.
So how exactly does the reMarkable tablet “protest” the effects of technology?
Outside of its aesthetic design, the viewer only gets a slight hint at the capabilities and qualities of the product. The remarkable tablet is essentially a tablet which one can interact with similarly to paper. You can take notes, read, and draw all on one consolidated device all without beeps and chimes to stealing focus from what you are working on.
So the tablet is able to carry over some of the benefits of technology the film lauds on technology. It allows consolidation and is multi-functional. Unfortunately, it isn’t a tool designed for efficient communication or access to information.
At the same time, it is able to solve some of the problems presented by the film. It certainly reduces distraction. That’s one of the main draws to the product. However, this product is unable to replace the complete functionality of the technology the film critiques so as a result, things like distracted driving, isolation, and addiction to technology will still exist. And this is where the problem with the film arises.
The way the film is set up, one couldn’t be blamed for believing it was a PSA until the final moments of the film. With this structure, the film makes a promise: present a problem and provide a path to a solution. It presents the problems borne of technology but the film’s solution is unclear. The film fails to present a solution, instead merely presenting a product. The result is the film’s viewer’s feeling as though the rug has been pulled out from underneath them.
All in all, the film is beautifully animated with a message which is generally crafted well enough to resonate with the viewer. The ad is also engaging. It grabs your interest within seconds of the film beginning and makes you curious about how the film ends. But it does not make the product more appealing. A stronger advert would have focused on the singular problem the tablet is capable of addressing, distractions, and then focused on the elements which are engaging about the product such as the aesthetic design and the unique “paper feeling” that comes with using the product. This would have been less emotionally evocative but would have better served the product being sold. Instead, we are left with a commercial that presents several problems and a product that does not solve them.
