Synopsis
This film is set in the year 2100 when no animal but human beings exist. All men and women have barcodes stamped on their necks and their memories and consciousness are under supervision. The city authorities sense that an image of an animal that existed before a century haunts the mind of a man. In other words, the man's mind catches the memories from his previous life. Under the present law, anyone who has an image other than that of human beings are subject to punishment. To look back upon the past and see the nature is a first-degree violation in this artificial city of progressive ideology. Will it be possible for a weak individual to be free from the tremendous grip of controlled society? This animation from Hong Kong exquisitely blends the familiar elements of apocalyptic science fictions in describing the police that controls and supervises human consciousness, the tightly-closed society where the artificial is praised over the nature, and the tragic end of a powerless individual who dares to venture into the forbidden land. The unrefined matiere of charcoal or pencil sketches override the screen, effectively expressing the suffocating atmosphere of the closed society, in sharp contrast to the primitive world of nature depicted in the form of a simple brush painting. (HONG Sung-Nam)