A Surrealistic Nightmare

Rating: 1/10 (22 December 2010)

Imagine, if you will, that Art is a planet. Imagine that this planet has a super-heated core constructed from compressed human intellect. Around this core is a mantle, formed from the fiery emotion which the intellect generates. And at the surface of this mantle is the crust: the final, coolest extremity of this hypothesis. It is made up of canyons of sculpture, seas of painting and mountains of poetry. These landscapes span the globe. This environment is populated with all the human souls that have ever lived. You are with them, in a city of televised skyscrapers.
The date is July 1st 1998.
Terrible rumours have been circulating. People have been whispering about a giant meteor. An intergalactic behemoth, they say. Something made of the same matter from which Planet Art was formed, but which is instead a grotesque parody. An abomination on a collision course. An extinction-level event.
A grim face appears on the colossal screens above the city.
"I address you tonight not as the President of Art, but as a citizen of humanity," booms a loud voice. "We are faced with the very gravest of challenges. The cinema calls this day 'Armageddon'. It is the end of all things. All of you praying with us need to know that everything that can be done to prevent this disaster is being called into service: our ability to create plots without holes; our entrenched knowledge of basic screen writing; the grasp of logic to determine that installing a simple hatch for exiting a spacecraft makes more sense than installing a hotel elevator - with 'freedom' written upon it; the ability to understand a machine gun has no place on a NASA funded meteor drilling mission, and that 'Space Dementia' is about as likely to make a drilling expert fire bullets at mining equipment as Sea Alzheimers is to make an ecologist drop torpedoes on whale sharks; Every step up the ladder of realistic emotional expression, every adventurous reach into artistic originality; even the horrible soap operas that we've watched have provided us the tools to wage this terrible battle. Through all of the chaos that is our history; through all of the wrongs and the discord; through all of the pain and suffering; through all of our times, there is one thing that has nourished our souls, and elevated our species above its origins, and that is our integrity. The dreams of an entire planet are focused tonight on the brave movie critics travelling into the heavens. And may we all, citizens the world over, see these events through. God speed, and good luck to you." The screen goes blank.
And Planet Art falls silent.