Hardin Jones (Jamie Draven) is the star of Panopticon TV, a live online portal accessing the prison system that invites subscribers to vote on and sometimes control the 'choices' of felons. It's Big Brother gone mad. After 10 years of this brutal existence, Hardin is ill-equipped to survive on the outside, but that's where he finds himself after being sprung from jail by a posse of hooded cyber-bandits.
Writer-director SA Halewood presents a dystopian world in which hospitals have been replaced by ATM-style medication dispensers, and robots - programmed by humans - have developed mental-health issues. Don't laugh; it could happen. There are no jobs; citizens sell organs online to survive. And with Hardin's face on every screen in the city via a 24-hour advertising loop, there is nowhere for him to hide.
But all is not lost. Hardin's younger brother Nash (Will Rothhaar) has refused to embrace The System. He and his fellow roof-dwellers (the Gilet Jaunes of 2039) threaten to hack into banks, close down the power grid and interrupt satellites if their demands -an end to the curfew and mandatory tagging - are not met. While the creator of Panopticon TV Neilsen (Alison Doody) yearns for the return of her golden goose Hardin, President Lyndon (Linus Roache) has a more measured approach, listening to the demands of the Gilet Jaunes - not least because they appear to be winning over the electorate.
It has to be said that Halewood's thesis, that modern technology enables the state to crush and commody the individual, is timely. In effect, Hardin represents most of us, the acquiescent, while his brother personifies individuality, dignity and freedom.
DIVISION 19 is well-crafted, powerfully acted, and hums with contemporary resonance. It asks a lot of its audience, but then that's the film's point. What are we and where are we heading, if we don't think for ourselves?
Writer-director SA Halewood presents a dystopian world in which hospitals have been replaced by ATM-style medication dispensers, and robots - programmed by humans - have developed mental-health issues. Don't laugh; it could happen. There are no jobs; citizens sell organs online to survive. And with Hardin's face on every screen in the city via a 24-hour advertising loop, there is nowhere for him to hide.
But all is not lost. Hardin's younger brother Nash (Will Rothhaar) has refused to embrace The System. He and his fellow roof-dwellers (the Gilet Jaunes of 2039) threaten to hack into banks, close down the power grid and interrupt satellites if their demands -an end to the curfew and mandatory tagging - are not met. While the creator of Panopticon TV Neilsen (Alison Doody) yearns for the return of her golden goose Hardin, President Lyndon (Linus Roache) has a more measured approach, listening to the demands of the Gilet Jaunes - not least because they appear to be winning over the electorate.
It has to be said that Halewood's thesis, that modern technology enables the state to crush and commody the individual, is timely. In effect, Hardin represents most of us, the acquiescent, while his brother personifies individuality, dignity and freedom.
DIVISION 19 is well-crafted, powerfully acted, and hums with contemporary resonance. It asks a lot of its audience, but then that's the film's point. What are we and where are we heading, if we don't think for ourselves?