YOU CAN’T KILL MEME
dir. Hayley Garrigus, 2021
78 mins. United States.
In English.
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 5 – 7PM with filmmaker in person for Q+A moderated by Joshua Citarella
(This event is $10.)
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 13 – 5 PM
FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 19 – MIDNIGHT
SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 27 – 7:30 PM
YOU CAN’T KILL MEME follows a filmmaker’s three year descent into the anonymous internet underworld, tracking the spread of an insidious strain of extremist occult magic.
While investigating the influence of online misinformation on the 2016 election, the filmmaker infiltrates the shadowy corners of Internet forums 4chan and Reddit. There, she learns of the book Memetic Magic, a field manual for conjuring “thought viruses” capable of sowing global chaos and a seminal text for the internet trolls who claim to have harnessed this chaos magic to meme Trump into presidency.
After establishing a correspondence with Memetic Magic’s elusive author, Kirk Packwood, the filmmaker relocates to Las Vegas to further her research on his advice just one week before the mass shooting in October 2017.
Describes by many as a powerful vortex, the city is home to the country’s second-largest population of “light workers” – magicians seeking to spiritually transform the world from within, spanning every sector of community and industry, from New Age entrepreneurs to military cybersecurity personnel. As the filmmaker heads to Seattle for a showdown with the hermetic Kirk, she uncovers what is either a cover cyberwar between chaos magicians and the power elite or an incredibly idiotic conspiracy spanning modern-day shamans, Pepe the Frog, the ebola pandemic, and the blowback of cancel culture.
Special thanks to Utopia Films.