I am ______: The Production and Upkeep of Lies for the Aesthetic

James Dubbeldam’s I am __ is a 5-minute rather simplistic drama depicting three facets of the influencer figure through moments in the life of a teenage vlogger. With just a single actor within the diegesis, the film uses title cards to deliver its commentary on the well-known misrepresentations on which contemporary social media is based.

Nathalie Soto Cuzin plays the unnamed vlogger, seen exclusively within the confines of her bedroom/production studio and largely from the same camera position, thus maintaining a tone of observation. Two different aspect ratios are used, vertical and horizontal, to distinguish between the girl’s online life and her offline self. This the film categorises not-reality and reality, respectively. What becomes a space for discussion on body positivity, climate change and cyberbullying loses the patina of progressive wisdom once the phone camera and ring light are off. In their place, the wider aspect ratio takes in the whole truth, well known by now and no less ineffective for it: edited images, impulsive shopping, and more.

Going further, the film shows a third and final facet: the potential consequences, i.e., self-harm and sex work. It is an unfinished list, but drives home the point, at least where the protagonist’s real-life counterpart demographic is concerned.

The most effective and memorable part of the film is the difference between the different aspect ratios. Which one allows the space for truth and which does not is strikingly laid out. If film tends to lie in service of truth, contemporary social media flips that order in favour of the aesthetic. The performing life is now democratised. Yay?