Lord of Rain

Description

In the story of “Lord of Rain” a young rebel is given the hard task of bringing the people of his home world back into the care of the benevolent A.I. Halo before their misguided and foolish leaders lead the planet to ruin. Gilead is a paradise, a world where all galactic cultures are welcome. The planet is controlled and taken care of by a sentient powerful A.I. named Halo. When Ahab and his wife Jess Belle become governors of Gilead they enact laws against immigration and override Halo’s control of the planet. In its place they put the cruel and despotic A.I. named Baal. As a result Gilead suffers severe droughts and famines. Halo reaches out to Elijah in hopes that he can show the people the error of following Baal. Elijah is forced to flee the capital and finally finds shelter with an immigrant widow and her son. Halo takes care of them and even saves the boy’s life. In the end Elijah helps Halo assume control of the planet again and challenges Baal, destroying his monument and returning the rain to Gilead.

Biblical Connection

“Lord of Rain” is a sci-fi retelling of the story of Elijah from the drought to his challenge of the false god Baal. We chose this story because we could see parallels between the moral discussions in the Biblical narrative and some of the recent events in European politics. Particularly we were very affected by the rise of nationalist parties to the top of the polls. In the story of Elijah the Israelites turn away from the worship of God. To us this is a metaphorical warning about the dangers of turning your back on the basic principles of love, tolerance and understanding. We felt that introducing the theme of nationalism (in its most negative form) would be bold but would complement the moral complexity of the story. In the Bible God saves the widow’s son and replenishes her stores of food and oil even though she is not one of the faithful. We feel that this is a lesson that it is not for people to decide who is worthy and who is not. We are all the same and deserving of respect. We strongly believe this story would translate into a powerful short film.