Andrew Niccol

Since his début movie GATTACA (1997) warned over the use of advanced eugenics, writer and director Andrew Niccol has continued to question the human and moral implications of advancements in technology with movies including THE TRUMAN SHOW (1999 – as writer), SIMONE (1992) and IN TIME (2011). His latest is ANON, a remarkably timely SF noir thriller about a society where everyone’s point of view experience is recorded and anonymity is a dirty word. Clive Owen - a detective on the verge of a nervous breakdown if ever we’ve seen one - stars as Sal Friedland, on the trail of a mysterious stranger played by Amanda Seyfried who has found a way to opt out of this tyrannical system and use the power of her anonymity in a unique and profitable way…

- Michael Coldwell

STARBURST: Like most of your writing, this feels like a very short jump into the future.

Andrew Niccol: That’s what I call a parallel presence. You’re going to go out on the street right now and you’re going to see people looking down at devices. You’re going to go to a concert and you’ll seeing nothing but people videoing the concert. They’re never going to look back at those videos, by the way, but it doesn’t matter, they still have to have evidence. We are life-logging.

In line with your previous work, there’s a very explicit warning message in this movie, but you’re also looking to tell an entertaining story. How do you walk that line?

I think you can see this film on a number of levels. On one level, it’s a serial killer film, if that’s what you want. There’s also sex, drugs, and violence! But if you go for ideas, that’s always my aim. Just in researching it, this word ‘de-anonymising’ [data mining in which anonymous data is cross-referenced with other sources of data to re-identify the anonymous data source] is such a horrendous concept.

What did you think when you saw Mark Zuckerberg sitting before Congress?

 I’m not on Facebook myself, but I think it was a wake-up call for people that not only does he have your cell phone number, he has the cell phone numbers of all of your contacts and he’s selling it. For me, it’s beyond the pale.

There’s a line on the film that hits the nail on the head: “You can stay anonymous, but it’s really fucking hard.”