Battery Unstable – One Hour Life Remaining

Robot and Scarecrow is a poignant fairytale romance between a robotic pop princess and a newly awakened scarecrow looking for something more out of life than just scaring birds away from a farmer’s crops. Can you blame him? After staring out at a farmer’s field for who knows how long, he finds himself immersed in a crowd of revelers at a large outdoor concert. As soon as Scarecrow arrives, he is taken by the beauty of the image of a female robotic performer on a massive video monitor setup at the venue.

Eventually, the robotic artist escapes her programmers and handlers and dashes off into the crowd. In hiding, she watches as the scarecrow is torn apart by concert revelers. She gathers up the shambled remains of the scarecrow and manages to reassemble him, and their brief romance begins.

I found this video to be very poignant not only in its handling of the impermanence of life but also from a robot’s rights perspective. It’s my hope that when humanity manages to create self-aware synthetic life, it will be wise enough to set it free. Love, no matter the source, must be allowed to flourish. All life is valuable and to be cherished.

The film drives home the notion that you need to embrace every moment given to you. The pop princess is malfunctioning throughout the sci-fi short and knows to the second when she will go offline permanently. At one point in the movie, at the height of the romance scenes, she gets the status:

“Battery unstable. One hour life remaining.”

What will you do when you get the message?

The robot decides to spend her last hour enjoying the time she has left. Eventually, she expires, and the scarecrow helplessly carries her back in the direction of the stage. Scarecrow collapses to his knees and gently places his love on the ground. The large video monitor plays a scene of the princess wearing wings as she walks off into the sunset.

Cast and Crew:

Director: Kibwe Tavares
Writers: Christopher O’Reilly and Ursula Rani Sarma
Stars: Jack O’Connell – Scarecrow, Holliday Grainger – Robot
Producer: Daniel Emmerson
Cinematography: Luke Jacobs
Music Supervisor: Sarah Bridge

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