Collage by Trinity Johnson, Photographer.
Why were professional photographers snapping pictures of students downward dogging on the DMAC lawn? Apparently, it has something to do with Taika Waititi’s recently released “Klara and the Sun.”
On Friday, Oct. 16, Sony hosted a promotional event on campus with a 30-minute yoga class and plenty of free treats and merchandise to promote the film. After an onslaught of negative reviews from early screenings, Sony attempts to reach a receptive audience with “Klara and the Sun.” Criticized for being a vapidly sunny exploration into the potential of a dark future, the Sony marketing team assures students that the film is a meditation on friendship and humanity.
Ironically, the friend in question is a robot.
After signing media release forms, the event began with a “sneak preview” of the film, with a filming notice posted towards the front of the DMAC screening room. The sneak preview was a brief interview with Jenna Ortega intercut with select footage from the trailer. Ortega promises viewers a heartwarming story of her character, Klara, a robot companion mending a mother-daughter relationship.
With the “intelligence of a toddler,” Klara watches a sunset and asks, “Is that where the sun lives?” Just from the trailer, Ortega’s character falls into a pitfall of the born-yesterday trope, a quirk shoved onto many family movie female leads since “Frozen.” And an empathetic approach to a synthetic friend might not play well in the current climate of artificial intelligence’s public reception.
“At the heart of Klara and the Sun, it is a story about friendship, family, love and what it means to be human. Inspired by those themes, we brought everyone here this afternoon, to focus on wellness, friendship and connection,” said Events Lead Assistant Kaya Hohense while addressing the participants. Following this, the students were led in the chant: “‘Klara and the Sun’: only in theaters October 23!” This was repeated six times throughout the event as the photographer panned through cheering students. In addition to filming the chant, Dodge social media manager Adriana Camposano shared with me a specific shot list that the marketing team hoped to capture of the event.
After the preview, students gathered on the sunny DMAC lawn to unroll complimentary yoga mats, place yellow sunflowers in kicked-off sneakers and stow phones in swag tote bags. Students followed along a beginner-level yoga session to the popular music of Tate McRae and The Weeknd.
“It was really a celebration of humanity, of love, of light. We wanted people to get off their phones, communicate with each other, move their bodies, celebrate, see the trailer and enjoy themselves immensely.” said the CEO of Inspired Consumer, Stav Vaisman.
Once instruction concluded, Hohense interviewed students in front of a wall of flowers, with the chance of being featured on Sony’s Instagram page. Questions were focused on moments shared with best friends and other feel-good stories. In line for the promised free acai bowls and matcha, surveys were passed out for students to fill out, with questions like: “As a result of this experience, how has your likelihood of seeing ‘Klara and the Sun’ in theaters changed?”
This event seems to be Sony’s attempt to backpedal on the portrayal of artificial friendship, as the event ironically centered on promoting unplugging from technology and introducing a third space to spend time with friends in the sun.
“We're taking themes of the movie, but trying to extrapolate and provide value for people, especially for college students who are overwhelmed (and) busy, especially considering the state of the world right now,” said Vaisman.
In the context of this event, Waititi’s film argues that symbiotic coexistence with artificial intelligence is not only possible, but might benefit interpersonal relationships between humans. It’s certainly an optimistic take on the daunting threat of necessary emotional heavy lifting being outsourced to technology. But ultimately, casting judgement on “Klara and the Sun” will require data outside of a “happy baby” pose.