The key virtue of this fim is showing us flat-earthers as fairly normal people going about their daily life. Surely, we also get briefly to see some stereotypical conspiracy nuts screaming absurd rants into a web cam or practising weird habits like juggling pingpong balls with sledge hammers while reciting the periodic table. But those are not the characters carrying the film. Rather we follow a couple of close friends, that seem fairly normal and likeable apart from their weird cosmological theories. As we get into their daily habits, their characters, their hopes and their lifestory, the real drama of this film is their ostentatious normality. Sure enough they seem blind to obvious counter-evidence and are inclined to motivated reasoning. But those are merely standard vices in exaggerated form, They are not vicious, unintelligent, or very pathological in their reasoning patterns. Rather they show great affection for each other and considerable kindness and social skill in maneuvering the unruly flatearth community. They are self-reflective and engaged individuals. Their possible tragic backgrounds, sexual problems, and religious obsessions are hinted at, but never allowed to take center stage. The viewer is left to wonder how the belief systems of such fairly ordinary people could pervert on such a drastic scale. This is the engaging mystery presented by their normalcy. The reviewers protesting that following those people around is merely a bore seemingly miss the key point of this film. It would be so easy to vilify flatearthers en masse, having scientific authorities point out their fallacies and blaming their ignorance. Then all we normal people could safely go back to sleep, convinced that nobody near us is vulnerable to such mental corruption. After this film we can't! If those people could become flatearthers, perhaps our friendly neighbours also could? perhaps they already are?
The film also has its moments of absurd and dark humor. The main protagonists trust heliocentric cosmology enough to drive hundreds of miles to witness a solar eclipse predicted by it. But once at the correct location, they use the opportunity to spread flatearth geocentric propaganda. Also, while distrusting the heliocentric account of the eclipse on complex (pseudo)-scientific grounds, they happily offer in its stead the childish alternative that the Sun simply hides itself, because it sure looks that way! And any purported counter-evidence produced by directing binoculars at the sky is explained away is either a hoax or simply part of The Great Presentation. In another laughable scene the main character refuses to recognize any direct flight routes on the Southern Hemisphere, despite the fact that e.g. several flights leave Cape Town for Sydney every day. The directors wisely choose to let this absurdity play out without interference or raised fingers, thus recogmizing that for someone so deeply distrustful, such blame is ineffecutal anyway.
In a funny way, some of the portrayed flatearthers to al arge degree exhibit the very virtues that led to modern science: Rather than accepting anything on blunt authority they hanker for explanations they can understand and evaluate by their own mental powers. Also they are willing to sacrifice anything else in pursuit of such understanding. But without any sufficient education, with no outside checks, and left to the ruthless social dynamics of modern internet life, however, such virtues are quickly eclipsed by the vices of narrowness, paranoid suspicion and confirmation bias. This holds a crucial lesson to anyone interested in scientific education policy, and the sociology of belief.
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