Fabien Benoit - Villa Albertine

Cinema

Houston

“In what society, in what world will we live? What is the cost of the digital utopia championed by Silicon Valley entrepreneurs? In the small town of Boca Chica, Texas, the wildest dreams are nurtured, and the boundaries of humanity are pushed, while others clash with the limits of the present.”

Who?

Trained in political science, journalism, and cinema, I have been exploring the dark side of the digital utopia for years. I particularly aim to grasp the materiality of new technologies, their impact on territories, and on citizens’ lives. My approach is documentary and embodied. It focuses on individuals, life journeys, and stories of struggle. I am drawn to people who fight and resist.

My documentary journey began over a decade ago when I went to gauge the pulse of the so-called ‘Indignant’ movement in Spain, which was then occupying the country’s squares to denounce the ravages of the 2008 financial crisis and the ineptitude of the ruling political class. Since then, my work has expanded into many directions that question our social life: digital transformations, Silicon Valley ideology, as well as ecology and social movements.

Graduated from Sciences Po, the European Centre for Journalism Training, and with a master’s degree in documentary cinema from Paris 7, Fabien Benoit is a journalist, author, and filmmaker. He is the author of several books, including The Valley: A Political History of Silicon Valley (Les Arènes, 2019) and Techno-luttes: An Investigation into Those Who Resist Technology (with Nicolas Celnik, Seuil, 2022). He has directed several films and documentary series, including The Last Town (Arte, 2023), which follows the fight of East Palo Alto residents, in the heart of Silicon Valley, against the power of tech giants. He also contributes to magazines such as Socialter, Usbek & Rica, and the news site Reporterre.

What?

With my documentary project Rocketland, I aim to continue my exploration of the dark side of digital utopia and its impact on territories and populations. In the small town of Boca Chica, Texas, on the Mexican border, entrepreneur Elon Musk—who has become the embodiment of Silicon Valley capitalism—has established his SpaceX Starbase, from which he aims to reach Mars. Launches and crashes are multiplying, disrupting daily life. While the company’s employees and the billionaire’s admirers invest in the region, intoxicated by tech promises, local residents grapple with present-day urgencies in a territory that serves as a gateway for migrants into the United States.

In Boca Chica, all the founding myths of America emerge and are reinterpreted: destiny, the frontier, conquest, the gold rush—or space—or the figure of the providential man, the self-made individual who, through his genius and will alone, changes the course of history. My project will specifically address these myths, particularly that of the frontier. This frontier of humanity that Elon Musk seeks to push back and that fascinates his admirers and supporters who have settled in Boca Chica. The American-Mexican border, inescapable, materialized by Donald Trump’s wall, the Rio Grande, the checkpoints, the omnipresent police, waiting migrants, and poverty. The frontier, finally, between two worlds that are unaware of each other but can, at times, collide.

Where?

Texas embodies the dreams of space exploration, and Boca Chica represents the ‘New Space,’ a new era marked by the involvement of tech entrepreneurs in space conquest and the colonization of Mars. In this region and city, I aim to meet those who have abandoned everything to live as close as possible to Elon Musk’s space base, convinced that they are witnessing a unique milestone—a turning point—in human history. But I also want to meet those who are the forgotten of this dream, its critics, and those defending a territory they feel has been colonized by SpaceX, its employees, and supporters. Between Austin, which some describe as a new Silicon Valley where Elon Musk has established many of his companies, Boca Chica, and the neighboring city of Brownsville, nestled against the American-Mexican border, I intend to capture what is unfolding in this singular place and what it reveals about our present and our future. What it tells us about America.

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