HOT DOCS 2018 REVIEWS: Daniel J. Clark ‘s BEHIND THE CURVE takes an empathetic and civil look at the people inhabiting the Flat Earth Society

Daniel J. Clark’s BEHIND THE CURVE; HOT DOCS 2018 REVIEWS — takes an empathetic and civil look at the people inhabiting the Flat Earth Society

Well, it’s 2018, and here we are, actually entertaining a cultural movement which believes that the earth is flat. Until the last 15 or so years, telling someone they believed this scientifically-proven fallacy was a cliché means of insulting one’s intelligence.

Daniel J. Clark’s BEHIND THE CURVE Review from HOT DOCS 2018

Now we’re in an era where celebrities are speaking out in the name of this “theory” and Very Responsible People – some of whom are in the STEM field in one way or another – are lending legitimacy to this wholly unreasonable position, debunked using basic geometry over two millennia ago.

And it’s a very hard thing to understand. So along comes documentary filmmaker Daniel J. Clark to turn his lens on this tenacious subculture to try to understand – how in the hell do intelligent folks buy into this nonsense?

Behind the Curve is an incredibly fair and non-judgmental look into this world which really does make sense of this phenomenon. It’s also an enthralling and entertaining journey to an alternate planet which we happen to share with a lot of people we may vehemently disagree with.

Full disclosure: I’m not a scientist. I haven’t done the theorem which proves the curvature of the earth. I just do what a lot of people do – I make a decision about which experts I will choose to believe. And that’s exactly the Flat-Earthers do, too. Because as the film clearly shows, members of these various societies aren’t really being scientific about their approach. Patiently, Clark lets them tell their own stories. Most of the focus is on two true believers – Mark and Patricia. Getting to know them in a very organic way during the course of the film reveals a great deal about what it takes to get people to believe some very strange ideas. They are nice people. They keep regular jobs. They are trained in their disciplines. But something else is going on, and yes, Behind the Curve shows us what that is.

Through a series of convoluted dissertations, dubious experiments, half-considered assumptions, and, well – conspiracy theories (which these folks themselves call it) – the audience gets a glimpse into the special flavor of system justification which rules these human minds. Never mind that their experiments fall flat (sorry). Never mind all the scientists who try to explain the reality of physics. What stands out in the film is just how much the flat earthers simply need to believe what they believe.

It’s kind of like refusing to believe that OJ was guilty or maybe even letting go of the Santa Claus myth.

The characters in the film are all too familiar. They’ve chosen to attach their identity to this belief system, and it means everything. It means friends, social connection, self-validation and even romance. Truly, it’s a religious fervor. And without even a hint of indictment, Clark lets the protagonists explain themselves on their own terms. It’s left for us but to watch. By sparing viewers from an advocacy position, we can pretty much see the dramatic arc of the films’ subjects for what they are: fallible, emotional, needing to belong, needing to have something to have faith in. Clark encapsulates it all in a single interview question to Patricia: “What source do you trust?”

Unironically, Patricia responds: “Myself.”

At bottom, she’s just like the rest of us in that regard. Sure, she, Mark and all the other characters we meet might be nuts, but there’s a little bit of them in all of us, and plenty of room on this spinning globe to share with them.