Endling

Description

Deep in the most remote corners of the world are seed vaults; concrete bunkers that hold copies of the world’s crops and plants in case of the worst. Endling follows a gentle robot working in one of these vaults as nuclear bombs rain down on the horizon outside. He delicately waters the plants in the vault, writes labels for the seeds in the drawers, and nurses the hope for the survival of life on Earth. At the end of the work day he checks the door to the vault. The crackle of the radiation metre and a red light. Locked. Before recharging for the night, he carefully paints a tree. But when he lies down to rest, a misplaced seed gets lodged in a crack in his head. He peers at his reflection, unsure what to do, before taking hold of a watering can and pouring it over his head.We jump forward in time to find the vault in bad condition. The paintings of trees covering the room tell us years have passed. Each looks more tortured and abstract than the last. Moss covers every surface. The air’s heavy with spores. We see the drawers that once held seeds now explode with plants. Our robot hobbles through the chaos. The seed in his head is now a sapling. Its roots burrow into his brain, slowly paralysing him. With trembling hands he does his best to take care of the plants but it’s slow and painful. He doesn’t even bother checking the vault door anymore. Sitting down to paint a tree, it ends up looking like a brown and green smear. His hands are trembling so much he can’t plug himself in to charge for the night. He just about musters the strength to water the sapling in his head. Tipping his head back, his battery ebbs dangerously low. There’s a tap at the window and a whistle. Could that be a bird? With the last of his strength he drags himself to the vault door. The crackling sound is gone. The light goes green. The door opens.Staggering out into the snow storm our robot searches desperately for what had made the noise. He follows the sound of the whistle and stops dead, seeing a figure on the horizon. He’s not alone. The robot raises a hopeful hand asking for help. BANG! The gunshot rips through his head. The figure runs over. It’s another robot. It scavenges our robot’s body for parts before running off. Our robot lies lifeless in the snow. The sapling from his head, now freed by the gunshot, trembles in the wind. In the final shot we see a magnificent tree standing in a field. Among its roots are our robot’s limbs. The sapling survived. It looks just like the trees from his paintings.

Biblical Connection

One thing the Bible doesn’t show is the toll that living on the ark had on Noah. For a year, he carried the responsibility for all life on Earth, whilst experiencing the trauma of watching everything else die in the waters surrounding him. That’s an unbelievable emotional cost I want to explore in the robot’s physical deterioration. And yet Noah kept the animals alive and healthy. He did his job and held onto hope even as God made him wait. The flood was a result of humanity’s violence. God wanted to hit reset. Yet when Noah stepped off the ark and the world started again, it soon fell back into violence. Noah didn’t live to see Jesus, he didn’t know the big picture. Did he question whether the work and trauma actually meant something in the end? That’s why, at the end of the film, our robot dies before getting to plant his seeds and see the sapling he’d nurtured come to life. His death’s a reflection of Noah’s final days watching the world fall back into sin. As humans are we strong enough to hold onto hope and work for a better future we may not live to see?