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Work? ‘I Think It Numbs You Somehow’
Is work working for us?
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By Maximilien Van Aertryck and Axel Danielson
Mr. Van Aertryck and Mr. Danielson are filmmakers.
Last year, during a pandemic that endangered and disrupted the global work force, Sweden’s public broadcaster Sveriges Television AB asked us to make a film about work. We were given unfettered access to its visual archives, studying the way work has been portrayed and discussed in the modern age.
While making the short documentary above, we began to ask ourselves questions about how work works today. As you may have seen in our previous Op-Doc, “Ten Meter Tower,” we’re filmmakers interested in human nature, examining how and why we do what we do.
Here, we ask whether we work to live or live to work. Can we achieve true democracy without considering economic democracy? Can economic growth and value be achieved only by exploiting the work of many to create value for the few?
Maximilien Van Aertryck and Axel Danielson are documentary filmmakers based in Gothenburg, Sweden, who have worked together since 2013. They previously directed the Op-Doc “Ten Meter Tower.”
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Op-Docs is a forum for short, opinionated documentaries by independent filmmakers. Learn more about Op-Docs and how to submit to the series. Follow The New York Times Opinion section on Facebook, Twitter (@NYTopinion) and Instagram.
