"When you tug at a single thing in nature, you find it attached to the rest of the world."

                                                                            --John Muir

Synopsis: Mixing powerful visuals, humor, and serious messages, Connected takes audiences on a stream-of-consciousness ride through the interconnectedness of humankind, nature, progress and morality at the dawn of the 21st Century. This film, discussion and Internet project explores the surprising links between biology, technology, and culture, illuminating the complex relationships between our actions and the world.

Through birds and bees, Botox, food, women’s rights, mercury, genetics, global trade, the Internet, population growth, among others, Connected negotiates the complex relationships between the individual and the collective, both in nature and in society.

Breaking from traditional documentary form, Connected is part documentary, part narrative, and part something completely different. It employs a symbolic collage of images, animation, and graphics in different contexts, making viewers laugh, think, and then rethink their preconceptions of progress, independence, and the consequences of their actions.

Objective: While public attention is often directed to specific issues of our day — the environment, population growth, poverty, globalization, human rights — Connected recontextualizes, in a fresh way, how all the crucial issues of the 21st Century are interlinked. The film’s display of interdependence gives a glimpse into the larger narrative of the society in which we live.

See the Trailer & Find out more about Connected at www.connectedthefilm.com

The Connected team recently moved into a Filmhouse Residency at Pier 27, San Francisco. The SF Film Society offered us the residency, and we are very happy to be in production surrounded by other filmmakers.

Tiffany also gave a talk outlining the new film at The Idea Festival, Sept 14, 2007.

1. ‣Listen to the podcast from the talk
   

2. ‣Read Daily EM  “Tiffany Shlain: Interdependence and Colony Collapse Disorder”
   

3. ‣Read Ethan Zuckerman’s Blog “Idea Festival: Tiffany Shlain’s Web of Ideas”
   

4. ‣Watch a film clip from The Idea Festival Interview
   

This film was developed last year during an Artist-in-Residency at The Headlands Center for the Arts.

To find out more about the project, please write to co-producer Carlton Evans, Phd carlton@moxieinstitute.org