A pixelated life

It’s disconcerting when a close family member suggests… “you’ve always been a little bit different.” But add a sinister pandemic and ensuing social disconnection to an already frail disposition? It’s a one-way ticket to lockdown lunacy. 

This gripping quarantine film, Day 48, by directed by James F Coton and produced by Aurelia F Coton, expertly conveys the fragments of fear that constant content consumption and screen-only interaction can foster, while following a young woman trying to cope with loss, loneliness and digital delusions.

Flicking ADHD-style between footage of world leaders announcing Covid doom, Insta views of squares of sky glimpsed from windows, Houseparty horrors, screens cluttered with constant comms, conspiracy theories and UFO sightings going more viral than a virus – it’s hardly surprising that a young mind might turn to paranoia and set to wondering if aliens are abroad. 

But as the story unfolds, is our heroine on an astral journey or is there something more sinister lurking in her brain?