Van Neistat directs this clever and whimsical film of Tom Sachs's performance art/sculpture exhibition called A Space Program. It was presented in New York City's Park Avenue Armory in 2012.
The quotation used at the beginning is from Buckminster Fuller who saw in both science and religion a parallel fascination with the question, Are we alone in the universe or not?
The make-believe event is the first mission to Mars with two women astronauts. A funky area has been created as a stand-in for Mission Control and another set aside for the rocket and the landing module.
In the quirky view of writers Tom Sachs and collaborator Van Neistat, the explorers and Mars mission team celebrate steel, plywood, and other tools and instruments which we usually take for granted. Here is something made of whatever materials are at hand, something created from a variety of available things. The French term for this creative impulse is bricolage.
On this voyage to outer space the two women astronauts squabble; the commander in chief drinks booze; there is film clip from Charles and Ray Eams on "Feedback"; and an Atari videogame is used to point out how things can go wrong on interplanetary journeys. Best of all is a tea ceremony that signals the need to slow down and live fully in the present moment.