Last and First Men: An Essay in Myth
Last and First Men, Dir. Jóhann Jóhannsson
The German philosopher Ernst Bloch talked of the “ontology of not yet being” as the main philosophical idea of our time. Bloch sought to explore how history reflects lost opportunities as well as future possibilities. He wanted to understand why humankind has always dreamed of utopia.
These ideas are given new expression in the late Icelandic musician and filmmaker Jóhann Jóhannsson’s film Last and First Men. Released in 2020, the film is a unique meditation on loss, change and what it means to be human. Shot in black and white, it opens with a view of an empty landscape under a lowering grey sky. A strange object begins to fill the screen, accompanied by the haunting music that flows through the film.
A disembodied narration, voiced in sombre tones by Tilda Swinton, speaks to us from 2,000 million years in the future. She urges us to, “Listen patiently. We, who are the Last Men, earnestly desire to communicate with you.” Humanity is facing extinction as the sun collides with a supernova. The Last Men want to help us. And they want us to help them.
Based on a 1930 novel by British philosopher and science fiction writer Olaf Stapledon, the film offers an intense, immersive experience. Eschewing traditional narrative, it takes the form of a cinematic prose-poem. The eerie score, by Jóhann Jóhannsson and Yair Elazar Glotman, provides a perfect backdrop for the unsettling, yet strangely beautiful images.
Abandoned monuments
The visuals revolve around a set of spomeniks, the abstract, space-age monuments built between 1960 and 1990, which dot the landscape of the former Republic of Yugoslavia. Designed to celebrate the defeat of fascism as well as articulate a vision of a new socialist society, many monoliths have been destroyed or stand derelict. But they still tell a powerful story about history, human potential and a future unrealised.
The film’s narrator relates how human existence has been characterised by huge fluctuations of joy and woe. Periods of dormancy and stagnation punctuated by rare bursts of creativity. By the time of the Last Men, the eighteenth species of humankind, they have evolved into the most advanced humans yet, having learned from the mistakes of earlier societies, and exist in a state of telepathic unity.
There are no human figures in the film. But the slow tracking shots over the spomeniks create a sense of movement and underpin the urgency of the narration. The film’s pared-back quality is one of its strengths. As Jóhannsson said, “I believe that things can be expressed very powerfully through simplicity.”
Facing extinction, the Last Men create a way of disseminating the spores of life via minute electromagnetic wave systems. But before they die, searching for consolation as their world physically disintegrates, they want to relearn that supreme achievement of the human spirit: loyalty to the forces of life embattled against death.
Our place in the cosmos
Last and First Men is a requiem for a lost civilisation. A lament for humanity’s unfulfilled potential. As we ponder the climate and ecological emergencies – which present us with a dramatic existential crisis – it’s all too easy to succumb to pessimism about the scope to change things for the better. But let us also reflect on our capacity to influence and create our own future.
Jóhannsson died before the film’s final edit and release. It was completed by Glotman and cinemaphotographer Sturla Brandth Grøvlen. The result is a fascinating contribution to the tradition of experimental science-fiction cinema.
The film closes on the gathering darkness, punctuated by a flickering oscilloscope. It invites us to reflect on human folly and the precarious nature of life. It is a film which deserves to be seen by a wide audience.