colourFIELD | Automatic Brain (1/2) - The Magic Of The Unconscious

Automatic Brain (1/2)

The Magic Of The Unconscious

Over 90 percent of all our daily actions are performed unconsciously — an autopilot in our head. Automatic Brain follows how these unconscious processes steer the lives of two ordinary people, from everyday routines to life choices such as finding a partner. A fascinating documentary that explores the work of the world’s leading scientists to discover how the unconscious brain shapes our attention, perception and memory.

Automatic Brain explores the work of the world’s leading scientists on the way the unconscious brain shapes our attention, perception and memory. With brain guru Allan Snyder of the University of Sydney, John Bargh at Yale, Henrik Ehrsson in Stockholm, Susana Martinez-Conde and Stephen Macknik in Phoenix, Arizona, and Walter Mischel at the Stanford kindergarten, we delve into the intriguing and often entertaining research of neuroscientists. We learn about futuristic devices that let us see the world as it really is, experience the sensation of being outside our own body, and discover what subconscious strategies small children invent to resist the temptation of a marshmallow. In discussion with Professor Allan Snyder we start to wonder if free will truly exists: ‘Who is really in charge?’ Snyder asks. ‘Is our consciousness no more than a PR department, there to make us believe we are really in control?”

Automatic Brain explores the work of the world’s leading scientists on the way the unconscious brain shapes our attention, perception and memory. With brain guru Allan Snyder of the University of Sydney, John Bargh at Yale, Henrik Ehrsson in Stockholm, Susana Martinez-Conde and Stephen Macknik in Phoenix, Arizona, and Walter Mischel at the Stanford kindergarten, we delve into the intriguing and often entertaining research of neuroscientists. We learn about futuristic devices that let us see the world as it really is, experience the sensation of being outside our own body, and discover what subconscious strategies small children invent to resist the temptation of a marshmallow. In discussion with Professor Allan Snyder we start to wonder if free will truly exists: ‘Who is really in charge?’ Snyder asks. ‘Is our consciousness no more than a PR department, there to make us believe we are really in control?”

Automatic Brain (1/2)

Videos

Watch Trailer (German)
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Facts

First aired on 9th December 2011, 9:45 p.m., on Arte, 23rd July 2012, 11.40pm on ARD

Awarded Gold World Medal at New York Festival
Awarded Audience Prize at Paris-science
Awarded European Science TV Award
Awarded Chicago International Film Festival, Best Non-Fiction
Nominated Adolf-Grimme-Prize

Shot on locations in Germany, USA, United Kingdom, Sweden, France, Australia

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The alarm clock rings and a young woman, called Martha in the film, crawls tiredly out of bed. What follows is familiar to everyone: the sleepy walk to the bathroom, brushing your teeth, making coffee, answering your first emails—and then the journey to work. Anyone who has ever had to do this with a hangover knows that the mind somehow switches to autopilot during this daily routine, while the conscious self can barely keep up and watches sluggishly from the sidelines. In their entertaining science documentary, Francesca D'Amicis, Petra Höfer, and Freddie Röckenhaus show that this mysterious “automatic” mode does not just take control occasionally: like a good spirit, it continuously guides us through the lowlands of everyday life. Only occasionally, when we lose track, does the conscious self intervene to correct us, like a driving instructor who prevents his student from mowing down a row of garbage cans.

Manfred Riepe/FK / Funkkorrepondenz 29/2012

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What exactly happens in the human brain when these proven automatisms take effect? Renowned neuroscientists from around the world are trying to get to the bottom of this question. As is usual in a science documentary, the film shows their talking heads, often presenting very specific theories. What is funny about this two-part film, however, is that these theories are not only illustrated by documenting scientific experiments in the style of “amusing physics,” but that the filmmakers also use elaborate animations showing the inner workings of neurons to attempt to take a (admittedly fictional) look inside the brain of young Martha as she encounters a young man named Jake on her way to work. named Jake: Is it true love or just a quickly cooling flirtation? In a truly exciting and humorous way, D'Amicis, Höfer, and Röckenhaus provide scientific—but never overly serious—answers to this question.

Manfred Riepe/FK / Funkkorrepondenz 29/2012

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While Martha and Jake meet for their first meal together in a restaurant, the neurophysiological processes in their brains are subjected to “scientific supervision”: It's a little reminiscent of comedian Otto Waalkes' famous sketch: "Ear to cerebrum, ear to cerebrum: Just had to hear the word ‘drunkard’. Cerebrum to ear: From whom? Ear to cerebrum: I can't see! Ask the eye." With their program “Das automatische Gehirn” (The Automatic Brain), first broadcast on Arte (production: Colourfield), the authors succeed in communicating complex scientific content in a typically Anglo-Saxon style. Their two-part series takes a strictly positivist view, in the spirit of hard science, of areas that would traditionally be classified as ‘soft’ sciences such as psychology or psychoanalysis. Nevertheless, the theses are not conveyed in a soullessly abstract way, but in a rather sensual manner. This is particularly true of the core thesis, according to which only a comparatively tiny section of the reality surrounding us ever comes into focus in our consciousness.

Manfred Riepe/FK / Funkkorrepondenz 29/2012

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To illustrate this process, the film looks over the shoulder of the famous magician Apollo Robbins as he performs spectacular magic tricks. According to the scientific message, his tricks only work because the attention of the duped observer is wandering somewhere on the periphery—while the magician unnoticed steals the watch from his “victim's” wrist. And it is precisely this absent-mindedness, with which we too allow ourselves to be constantly distracted, that the brain must, in a sense, elevate to a principle – because otherwise it would be so flooded with information that no decision would be possible. The writer of this review was also able to observe this process in himself while writing his television review. This self-reflective look back at the viewer is stimulated because the film skillfully presents current theories in neuroscience and conveys them with a certain added value.

Manfred Riepe/FK / Funkkorrepondenz 29/2012

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The second part explores the issues in a stimulating way: Jake and Martha, played humorously by Johannes Moss and Henriette Fee Grützner, have fallen head over heels in love with each other. But this is not entirely pleasant for either of them, because according to neuroscientific findings, “being in love is mainly stress.” And the film shows us what that means in a tongue-in-cheek improvised debate. In addition to these refreshing, meaningfully integrated scenes and interesting visual material, there is a third level: by solving funny psychological tests, the viewer becomes a test subject themselves—and is thus mischievously integrated into the film. Rarely has science been conveyed in such a charming way.

Manfred Riepe/FK / Funkkorrepondenz 29/2012

Credits

Written, directed and produced by: Petra Höfer, Freddie Röckenhaus and Francesca D’Amicis

Cast: Henriette-Fee Grützner (Martha), Johannes Moss (Jake), Anja Signitzer, Apollo Robbins

Director of Photography: Marcus von Kleist

Video Editor: Johannes Fritsche

Producer: Kay Schlasse

Line Producer: Svenja Mandel

Narration: Benjamin Völz (German), James Mitchell (English)

Commissioning Editors: Thomas Hallet (WDR), Thomas Kamp (WDR)

A colourFIELD production, co-produced by WDR Cologne

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