THE PHENOMENON OF PRESENCE
Simon Brooks
2024
10 min
United Kingdom
English
The architect of a virtual world called Presence is interviewed about its profound capabilities – it can trigger lucidity in Alzheimer’s patients. Meanwhile, inside Presence, a daughter tries to reconnect with her mother, an Alzheimer’s sufferer, and bring her back to the physical world.
The Phenomenon of Presence (TPOP) is a cerebral sci-fi thriller looking into our near future and exploring the possibilities of how technology may soon change our lives forever.
TPOP explores the ongoing relationship between technology, psychology and neurological conditions such as dementia.
In the near future, a virtual world called “Presence” has the unexpected side effect of easing the symptoms of certain forms of dementia. Across the globe millions of sufferers escape into this world, leaving their loved ones behind.
The film asks the question: “If you lost your loved one to a virtual world you knew would help their condition, would you let them go forever?”
Director Biography
As a director, Simon predominantly works in the commercial and online promo spheres. Over the last decade he has directed numerous TVCs, music videos and an award winning short film.
Simon’s work is characterised by its bold and vibrant visuals with sound design always playing a key role. In his personal projects the themes of death, morality, technology and psychology are often examined and he is always looking to explore these ideas in new, metaphysical ways. The next step for him in his career is to transition from commercials to directing more long form, narrative projects.
Director Statement
This film is very personal to me and I believe that it deals with the subject of dementia in a unique way.
As someone who has seen their father die with the disease I wanted to create something that wasn’t a straightforward gritty drama as we’ve seen this a thousand times. I wanted to create something forward thinking, cerebral, and something that raises questions about the future of how we will deal with this type of disease.
The film is a teaser into a much larger world which I am developing. I currently have a 38 page treatment for an 8 hour series ready to go, please get in touch for a link to this document. It’s far too big to upload here. simonbrooksfilm@gmail.com
I want to get charities and organisations that are helping people with these conditions involved with the next stages of the project as I believe it’s an interesting way to start the conversation about how we deal with these diseases in the future.
This film is my first attempt at a short film with dialogue and I’ve learnt a lot on the way. I decided to work with two new actors in the main roles as I felt we could go on the journey together. I thoroughly enjoyed the rehearsal process before the shoot as we discovered the tone and pace of the main scene.
Sound quality in film (especially shorts) is something often overlooked and because of the topic it felt right to push this as far as we could so the master mix is Dolby Atmos; with 7.1, 5.1, binaural and stereo versions available for presentation. I’m looking at offering this as a VR film as well with the binaural mix.
I made this film with my beloved and incredibly talented team that are all based in the northwest of the UK (predominately Manchester). I could not have done any of this without their support and hard work and will be forever indebted to them in making this happen.
We’ve shown what our team can do with £12k of a self-funded budget. Now we want the chance to turn this world into a series.
Simon Brooks
