A heady, carefully constructed documentary collage, All Light, Everywhere goes back to the beginning of cinematographic history to provide context for the way camera surveillance is an increasingly common (and unreliable) aspect of society. From the prototypical lenses used to view the 1874 transit of Venus to the body cameras employed by police departments across the United States, director Theo Anthony forces viewers to confront the “black-drop effect,” by which “the act of observation obscures the observation.” In other words, how can we really trust what we see, especially when it’s been technologically interpreted for the screen? All Light, Everywhere is very smart and extremely meta (Anthony often films himself and his crew setting up a shot, to emphasize the observational point), though it can be a bit dry. With its purposefully monotone voiceover and delivery of contextual information via subtitles, the documentary often seems to be going for the sort of reserved, unbiased aesthetic that its very thesis would argue is impossible.
