"What happens when authentic emotions are born within a corrupt system?"
A short film about a love-hate relationship between Arnar and a 1993 Mazda 323F
Exploring the complexities of modernity, romance, and cars through performative autofiction
Short film
17 min
2025
Auto-Introspection confronts the paradox of loving something that is harmful. Through an allegorical love story with a 1993 Mazda, the project reflects on the emotional entanglement with cars, romantic ideals, and modernist values in Western society.
The narrative unfolds across three layers:
1 The personal connection with the car
2 The societal ideals tied to cars and relationships
3 a broader critique of Modernity itself.
Blending autobiography, fiction, and documentary, the project engages in a meta-reflection on performance, identity, and the sensory experience of living in a car-dominated world.
Through tactile visual sequences and anthropomorphized perspectives, the film challenges conventional narratives, asking how emotions shaped by modern systems can be both genuine and constrained.
Title graphics by janoschkratz.eu
Auto-Introspection_Reflective_Essay_Arnar_Gustafsson.pdf
Reflective essay on the creation process for the film.
Chapters include:
1 Thematics
2 Blending genres // Ideals
3 Performance of Self
4 Haptic visuality
1 Thematics
2 Blending genres // Ideals
3 Performance of Self
4 Haptic visuality
“Enter the car—a symbol of autonomy and mobility in the landscape of Modernity. Its allure lies in the promise of freedom, yet this freedom is paradoxical, contingent upon a system of car-oriented urban planning that constrains rather than liberates. Our dependence on cars mirrors our entanglement with Modernity itself—a Faustian bargain where progress comes at the expense of environmental degradation, social alienation, and spatial inequality.”
