Message from the Future II: The Years of Repair is an animated short film that dares to dream of a future in which 2020 is a historic turning point, where the lessons of the COVID-19 pandemic and global uprisings against racism drive us to build a better society in which no one is sacrificed, and everyone is essential.
It is a sequel to last year's A Message from the Future with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and its message is that 2020 became a "historic turning point" for the world, one in which "the lessons of the COVID-19 pandemic and global uprisings against racism drive us to build back a better society in which no one is sacrificed, and everyone is essential."
In her launch piece for The Intercept, Executive Producer Naomi Klein wrote: "The Movement for Black Lives has redrawn the political map, and nurses are local heroes. If this isn’t the time to advance a vision of the world governed by radically more humane and inclusive values, when is?
"A short piece of art is not a political platform, and so it was never our goal to be comprehensive. Rather, we looked for threads of connection in the hopes that they would inspire more.
"In the film, COVID-19 acts as a kind of character in the drama, almost like a tough teacher instructing humanity in a series of lessons that should have been obvious long ago. Lessons about the essential labor that makes life possible and enjoyable — and yet has been so persistently discounted. Lessons about systemic racism as an assault on the human body, one that makes it more vulnerable on every front. Lessons about how community is our best technology, especially during times of crisis. Lessons about how damage done to the natural world will invariably blow back on us, whether in the form of disease or climate disruption or both."
The film features the art of Molly Crabapple, with the political storytelling of Naomi Klein, Avi Lewis and Opal Tometi. The cast of narrators from around the world includes Tometi, Emma Thompson, Gael García Bernal, and the Nigerian poet and activist Nnimmo Bassey.