“The future of Black cinema. Utilizes everything the medium has to offer. Gorgeously photographed… requires the largest screen possible. Pure cinematic power.” - Jourdain Searles, The Hollywood Reporter
“Visionary. A journey of visual ecstasy.” - Valerie Complex, Deadline
“Hauntingly beautiful and deeply enigmatic.” - Lisa Kennedy, Variety
"Critic’s Pick! Mind-bending. An Afrofuturist fantasia that is also a musical, a science-fiction parable and a hacker manifesto.” – A. O. Scott, The New York Times
Multi-hyphenate, multidisciplinary artist Saul Williams brings his unique dynamism to this Afrofuturist vision, a sci-fi punk musical that’s a visually wondrous amalgamation of themes, ideas, and songs that Williams has explored in his work, notably his 2016 album MartyrLoserKing. Co-directed with the Rwandan-born artist and cinematographer Anisia Uzeyman, the film takes place in the hilltops of Burundi, where a group of escaped coltan miners form an anti-colonialist computer hacker collective. From their camp in an otherworldly e-waste dump, they attempt a takeover of the authoritarian regime exploiting the region's natural resources – and its people. When an intersex runaway and an escaped coltan miner find each other through cosmic forces, their connection sparks glitches within the greater divine circuitry. Set between states of being—past and present, dream and waking life, colonized and free, male and female, memory and prescience—Neptune Frost is an invigorating and empowering direct download to the cerebral cortex and a call to reclaim technology for progressive political ends.
LO-FI SCI-FI | January 30–February 24, 2026
Big ideas with small budgets, practical effects over digital enhancement, and human-scale story are the hallmarks of LO-FI SCI-FI films. These eight titles engage our love of the science fiction genre, employing a bevy of imaginative approaches: high concepts in quotidian worlds, imaginative production design to approximate mind-bending alternate realities, and the scientific questions of their time in relatable themes of love and self-discovery.
The Film Center is ADA accessible. This presentation will be projected without open captions. The theater is hearing-loop equipped. For accessibility requests, please email filmcenter@saic.edu