The Story
What if we lived in a world where children were no longer born? What if children didn’t grow up running around and didn’t have to worry about sickness or school? What if on your 18th birthday you were simply downloaded? Its an intriguing question and it was something delved into with the Matrix series but Happy Downloadday takes a new and interesting approach to the subject of the virtual world.
In The Matrix, the computers ran our lives and ‘made’ humans for the sole purpose of using them to sustain their existence. Humans were no longer born. It was a mind blowing idea that we could all be in a dream world, living a life in a virtual reality that we didn’t even know existed. Happy Downloadday takes away the evil computer overlords and looks at the simple truth in todays world. Children are expected to become adults much sooner in their lives than ever before. They are expected to be productive people from the moment they hit 18.
In a time where massive recession and a bad economy mean less jobs for parents, what would the world be like, if children were no longer born? If they were simply downloaded into a grown human body at the age of 18. Their mind and existence nothing more than a computer simulation that is then downloaded into a body.
In Happy Downloadday the reason children are no longer born is not that dissimilar to the drop in birth rates we see during depressions. Resources on earth are scarce so children have to be raised as computer programs and then downloaded into artifially grown human bodies once they mature, virtually, to 18 years of age. As one might expect of any teen virtual or real, not everyone is happy about the complete control parents have over their virtual children until they are downloaded. The main character in this story Sam, is played by Nick Eversman. Nick was recently seen on ABC’s Missing as Ashley Judd’s son. He refuses to be downloaded and risks being deleted by his parents.
The Director and Writer
Sophie Leclerc directs this film and has a long history of great work on the big screen we have all seen. A Paris native, she moved to the United States in 1985 where she completed a Master of Arts in Broadcasting at San Francisco State University and began her filmmaking journey shooting, editing, and directing documentaries. In 1993, she relocated to Los Angeles to start a successful career as a visual effects producer. Her visual effects producer credits include titles such as Terry Gilliam’s “The Brothers Grimm”, Andrew Dominik’s “The Assassination of Jesse James by the coward Robert Ford”, and recently Joe Carnahan’s “The Grey”. In 2004, she won an Emmy Award for Outstanding Special Visual Effects for a Miniseries called “Dreamkeeper”, directed by Steve Barron. Sophie lives in Hollywood, CA.
Sundance and UCLA alum Phil Ferriere is a Nicholl Fellowships quarter-finalist and has won many well-regarded screenwriting competitions.
They need our help
As with any indie project, Happy Downloadday needs your help to complete their project. They have started a kickstarter project to raise the funds needed to complete the project and have offered you some unique rewards for helping out with the project. As an avid science fiction fan, this story grabbed my attention as a new and unique approach to an age old question of how humanity survives on a planet whose resources are stressed beyond repair and how continued advancements in computers and technology play a role in our lives.
