Hacking at Leaves is a 2024 Austrian documentary film directed and written by

Johannes Grenzfurthner Johannes Grenzfurthner (; born 1975 in Vienna) is an Austrian artist, filmmaker, writer, actor, curator, theatre director, performer and lecturer. Grenzfurthner is the founder, conceiver and artistic director of ''monochrom'', an international ar ...

. It explores various themes including the United States' colonial past,

Navajo The Navajo or Diné are an Indigenous people of the Southwestern United States. Their traditional language is Diné bizaad, a Southern Athabascan language. The states with the largest Diné populations are Arizona (140,263) and New Mexico (1 ...

tribal history, and the hacker movement, through the lens of the story of a

hackerspace A hackerspace (also referred to as a hacklab, hackspace, or makerspace) is a community-operated, often "not for profit" (501(c)(3) in the United States), workspace where people with common interests, such as computers, machining, technology, sci ...

Durango, Colorado Durango is the home rule city that is the county seat and the most populous municipality of La Plata County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 19,071 at the 2020 United States census. Durango is the home of Fort Lewis College ...

, during the early phase of the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

. The film was produced by

monochrom Monochrom (stylised as monochrom) is an international art-technology-philosophy group, publishing house and film production company. It was founded in 1993, and defines itself as "an unpeculiar mixture of proto-aesthetic fringe work, pop att ...

Plot

''Hacking at Leaves'' features Austrian artist and filmmaker Johannes Grenzfurthner as both host and director, blending documentary and fiction to delve into themes of optimism, freedom, settler colonialism, pandemics, and societal collapse within the American context. The film introduces a fictional element to convey its message. Grenzfurthner, clad in a yellow radiation suit, sits in a 1970s-style control room (which he refers to as his "flat"), contemplating whether he should create a documentary about a makerspace at the Powerhouse Science Center in Durango, Colorado. This makerspace played a pivotal role in the global response to COVID-19 by producing medical equipment for the hard-hit

Navajo Nation The Navajo Nation (), also known as Navajoland, is an Indian reservation of Navajo people in the United States. It occupies portions of northeastern Arizona, northwestern New Mexico, and southeastern Utah. The seat of government is located in ...

. However, Grenzfurthner is deterred by the thought that the content might be too depressing, and he doubts his ability to "sell it to

Netflix Netflix is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service. The service primarily distributes original and acquired films and television shows from various genres, and it is available internationally in multiple lang ...

." Uncle Sam (performed by

Max Grodénchik Max Grodénchik (born November 12, 1952), also known as Michael Grodénchik, is an American stage, film, and television actor, best known for his role as Rom, a recurring character on the television series '' Star Trek: Deep Space Nine''. Biogr ...

) appears, demanding that Grenzfurthner create an 'invigorating tale' about the 'spirit of freedom, the endless beauty of the American Southwest, and a forceful statement against collapse.' He seeks a 'true American story.'
Reluctantly, Grenzfurthner agrees to make the documentary, albeit with the intention of educating the audience about the downsides of the "American story" and colonialism. He navigates the complexities of these subjects, incorporating perspectives from activists, artists, and tech enthusiasts. The film draws connections between the Navajo community, hacker culture, and the DIY movement, suggesting that alternative approaches could facilitate societal transformation: "This is a story about communities. It narrates not only the history of the Navajo Community and its struggles but also the history of hacking and hackerspaces and how such communities function within mainstream culture." In an article in the Austrian magazine '' Profil'', Grenzfurthner addresses the importance of the

Overton window The Overton window is the range of subjects and arguments politically acceptable to the mainstream population at a given time. It is also known as the window of discourse. The key to the concept is that the window changes over time; it can shif ...

in discussing the contents of his documentary.

Cast

* Johannes Grenzfurthner as Himself *

as Uncle Sam * Morningstar Angeline as an anonymous anarcho-syndicalist Navajo hacker *

Chase Masterson Chase Masterson (born Christianne Carafano on February 26, 1963) is an American actress, singer and producer best known for her role as Leeta on ''Star Trek: Deep Space Nine''. She has appeared in the TV shows ''General Hospital'', ''Sliders'', ...

as two anonymous medical professionals Interviewees include Ryan Finnigan, Sunny Dooley, Stefan Yazzie,

Jello Biafra Eric Reed Boucher (born June 17, 1958), known professionally as Jello Biafra, is an American singer, spoken word artist and political activist. He is the former lead singer and songwriter for the San Francisco punk rock band Dead Kennedys. Init ...

Cory Doctorow Cory Efram Doctorow (; born 17 July 1971) is a Canadian-British blogger, journalist, and science fiction author who served as co-editor of the blog ''Boing Boing''. He is an activist in favour of liberalising copyright laws and a proponent of th ...

, Janene Yazzie, Karletta Chief,

Erik Davis Erik Davis (born June 12, 1967) is an American writer, scholar, journalist and public speaker whose writings have ranged from rock criticism to cultural analysis to creative explorations of esoteric mysticism. He is perhaps best known for his b ...

, Michael J. Epstein,

Mitch Altman Mitch Altman (born December 22, 1956) is a Berlin-based hacker and inventor of TV-B-Gone. He is a featured speaker at hacker conferences, an international expert on the hackerspace movement, and teaches introductory electronics workshops. He is ...

Jason Scott Jason Scott Sadofsky (born September 13, 1970) is an American archivist, historian of technology, filmmaker, performer, and actor. Scott has been known by the online pseudonyms Sketch, SketchCow, Sketch The Cow, The Slipped Disk, and textfiles. ...

, and many others.

Production

Grenzfurthner began working on the film in March 2020 and managed to collect all the interviews before the end of 2020. Due to the travel ban preventing Europeans from entering the United States, the director oversaw the shooting and interviewing processes remotely from his office in Vienna. He later began assembling the footage received from various collaborators with editor Sebastian Schreiner. Grenzfurthner worked with Navajo cultural advisors like Manuelito Wheeler of the Navajo Nation Museum. The framing story was filmed in the winter of 2020/2021 at the

Zwentendorf Nuclear Power Plant The Zwentendorf Nuclear Power Plant was the first commercial nuclear plant for electric power generation built in Austria, of three nuclear plants originally envisioned. Construction of the plant at Zwentendorf was finished but the plant never en ...

and in ''No Name City'', a former Western theme park in

Wöllersdorf-Steinabrückl Wöllersdorf-Steinabrückl is a municipality in the district of Wiener Neustadt-Land in the Austrian state of Lower Austria. Geography The municipality is located in the ''Industrieviertel'' (i. e.: Industrial Quarter) section of Lower Austria ...

. Before the film's release but after completing principal photography, Grenzfurthner hosted an exhibition in Anger, Styria in May 2021 to showcase parts of his research. The film was supported by the Austrian Ministry of Culture as part of its program to support innovative film.

Distribution

The film's world premiere took place at the

Diagonale The Diagonale (Festival of Austrian Film) is a film festival that takes place every March in Graz, Austria. The festival was initially held under the auspices of the Austrian Film Commission in Salzburg from 1993 to 1995 but moved to Graz in 19 ...

Film Festival in

Graz Graz () is the capital of the Austrian Federal states of Austria, federal state of Styria and the List of cities and towns in Austria, second-largest city in Austria, after Vienna. On 1 January 2025, Graz had a population of 306,068 (343,461 inc ...

Austria Austria, formally the Republic of Austria, is a landlocked country in Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine Federal states of Austria, states, of which the capital Vienna is the List of largest cities in Aust ...

, on April 6, 2024. Film festivals like ''Ethnocineca'' (Vienna) also screened the film. The United States premiere took place at the

Hackers on Planet Earth The Hackers on Planet Earth (HOPE) Computer security conference, conference series is a hacker convention sponsored by the security hacker magazine ''2600: The Hacker Quarterly'' that until 2020 was typically held at Hotel Pennsylvania, in Ma ...

conference on July 13, 2024. The film was also screened as part of a special screening of

Cucalorus Film Festival The Cucalorus Film Festival is a film festival held annually in Wilmington, North Carolina. It is one of the largest film festivals in the U.S. South and recognized as a destination film festival for indie filmmakers. MovieMaker magazine recogni ...

on August 8, 2024, and was selected for ''Celludroid Film Festival'' 2024 (South Africa) and

Red Nation Film Festival The Red Nation Film Festival is a film festival focused on films about indigenous people. The festival was founded in 1995 and is curated by Joanelle Romero. It is unconnected to The Red Nation. History The Red Nation Film Festival was fo ...

2024. The film was also screened as a special event at the ''

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American 501(c)(3) organization, non-profit organization founded in 1996 by Brewster Kahle that runs a digital library website, archive.org. It provides free access to collections of digitized media including web ...

'' in San Francisco on March 31, 2025.

Reception

Bradley Gibson of

Film Threat ''Film Threat'' is an American online film review publication, and earlier, a national magazine that focused primarily on independent film, although it also reviewed videos and DVDs of mainstream films, as well as Hollywood movies in theaters. ...

gave the film 8/10 and summarizes that the film "explores the corruption eating away at the core of American social and political structures and provides yet another example of capitalism's dismal failures." Journalist and media researcher Philipp Stadelmaier states, "This is not just about creating a 'movie,' but a toolkit that inspires DIY action. Anyone who wants to avert the apocalypse must let themselves be introduced to the technique of leaf hacking by Grenzfurthner, which aims to finally uproot a system that has been rotten for a long time."

Der Standard ''Der Standard'' () is an Austrian daily newspaper published in Vienna. It is considered a newspaper of record for Austria. History and profile ''Der Standard'' was founded by Oscar Bronner as a financial newspaper and published its first editio ...

writes: "The wild essay ''Hacking at Leaves'' by Johannes Grenzfurthner explores the connection between Indigenous Americans and hacking culture, uncovering the original colonial sin of the USA.""Das Ethnocineca-Filmfestival zeigt dokumentarische Ambivalenzen auf", Marian Wilhelm, Der Standard, 15 May 2024
/ref>

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Hacking at Leaves 2024 films 2024 documentary films 2024 independent films 2020s English-language films Austrian independent films Films about technological impact Documentary films about the Internet Documentary films about philosophy Documentary films about politics Documentary films about ideologies Nerd culture Hacker culture DIY culture Monochrom Internet culture Internet documentary films Films directed by Johannes Grenzfurthner Films set on the Navajo Nation Films shot in Colorado Films shot in Arizona Films shot in New Mexico Films shot in Austria Documentary films about Native Americans Documentary films about the COVID-19 pandemic Documentary films about nuclear technology English-language documentary films English-language independent films