Frankenšteins 2.0: Latvian Director Explores the Pursuit of Immortality

A new documentary, Frankenstein 2.0, from director Dāvis Sīmanis, will be hitting Latvian cinemas on January 14th, taking viewers on an often-absurd, yet captivating journey to meet scientists, tech pioneers, and self-proclaimed prophets of immortality across the US, Russia, and Europe. The film tackles society’s current fascination with defying death, asking whether mortality might soon be a problem of the past.

“I started out just wanting to find out if it was possible to live a little longer,” Sīmanis explains. “But then things got weird. Scientists at Yale are reviving pigs, people are implanting microchips in their brains, and biohackers are sharing tips on eternal youth. Humanity is already living in the age of transhumanism, and I feel like I’m the one falling behind.” Frankenstein 2.0, internationally titled Death of Death, premiered at the Jihlava International Documentary Film Festival in the Czech Republic. Sīmanis’ previous works include Escaping Riga (2014), Mūris (2018), Gads pirms kara (2021), Marijas klusums (2024), and others – blending documentary and art-house cinema with a poetic and philosophical approach.

Your documentary, Frankenstein 2.0, had its world premiere at the Jihlava International Documentary Film Festival in the Czech Republic, where the collaborative work Podnieks par Podnieku. Laika liecinieks (2024) by Antra Cilinska and Anna Viduleja also participated. Does having a historical backdrop help a film gain recognition in the modern landscape?

“I think a historical foundation helps when thinking about documentary filmmaking and referencing the core principles of the poetic documentary film tradition of Riga. But getting into festivals still requires fighting for each new work. And for those who work in both documentary and fiction, it’s about solidifying your position on two fronts. I’ve been fortunate enough to have my films participate in most of the major documentary film festivals, but it’s more difficult for emerging filmmakers. Quality of work is assessed, of course, but there are also external factors – connections, previous visibility, and so on. Right now, the competition to get into festivals is almost titanic, with thousands of submissions vying for limited slots each year.”

What advice would you give to young filmmakers facing this challenge?

“We often discuss this at the National Film School of the Latvian Academy of Culture. First, you need to find your voice, which means thinking about the form of documentary filmmaking and making it distinctive and surprising in its techniques. Second, unlike feature films where invented worlds allow for expansive fantasy, documentary requires you to commit to real people, events, or phenomena. Alongside a new and original style, you need to uncover themes that surprise viewers, revealing a world they didn’t know existed. If young authors can combine these two aspects, they will eventually be noticed. We often get stuck in the narrative that we only tell Latvian stories, but we are part of a huge system, so it makes sense to look for stories outside of Latvia, to show that it’s possible to transcend borders and stand above them.”

Frankenstein 2.0 explores modern society’s obsession with immortality. The film is directed by Dāvis Sīmanis, with Uldis Tīrons as co-writer and Andrejs Rudzāts as cinematographer. It’s a Latvian-Czech co-production. Publicity photo

Is this also related to funding?

“It’s a matter of ambition, not funding. You can find different solutions – work with a small crew or in an unexpected format that fits a limited budget.”

Do you strive to find a new expressive style with each film?

“I see a lineage of techniques in my documentaries, but each time they take on a new dimension. For example, I’ve been using voiceover in recent works. I probably won’t use it in my next films, though, because this personal essayistic approach requires a huge emotional investment that isn’t always necessary for certain subjects. I absorb different techniques and then try to lose them again.”

The origins of your documentary, Frankenstein 2.0, lie in the pandemic. Could you tell us more about the genesis of this project?

“Several things converged at once. I was turning forty, my child was born, and the pandemic began. I remember looking out the window of the maternity hospital, across from the Culture Academy, watching people go to a play at the New Riga Theatre, and then a few days later, lockdown started. Everything shut down. I felt this strong sense of generational change and my own mortality, which was amplified by the isolation of the pandemic and the realization that the world wasn’t coping well with this global catastrophe. Then, the Russian invasion of Ukraine added another layer, making the concept of longevity seem absurd in the face of a war killing thousands of innocent, often young, people. The Russian context also appears in the film, as it was in Soviet Russia that early Bolsheviks were among the first to dream of significantly extending life or reviving people, influenced by the ideas of philosopher Nikolai Fedorov. Even the current Russian regime is deeply concerned with this issue. It just proves that any topic is, in one way or another, connected to power and politics.”

Did these global events influence the filmmaking process? Did the initial idea evolve?

“Absolutely. The pandemic restricted travel, and the war forced us to halt filming in Russia. But the core idea – that the film is about the pursuit of immortality or at least radical life extension – remained. However, my perspective changed. I started as a somewhat sarcastic skeptic, gently mocking these ideas, but now I can say that I look at them differently. We often see people who hold a certain belief and dismiss them as oddballs, but over time we realize that human progress has been possible thanks to them, not because everyone lived in total caution and didn’t dare to dream. Perhaps among our characters are the new Newtons, Copernicuses, or anyone else whose ideas will trigger global scientific tectonic shifts.”

Has your attitude towards science or the ideas of transhumanism changed?

“Both towards science and towards longevity, and also towards our place in this world and the potential impact of extending life. Many reflections are emerging on the usefulness of death as a boundary or endpoint of life, and many respected thinkers believe that it is a necessary concentrating force for humans.”

To keep us engaged in this life?

“It’s like editing a film. If you put together all forty-five to fifty hours of footage, it would be a tedious, amorphous audiovisual line. But editing tightens the film, marking the boundaries of where it begins and ends, and highlighting the most powerful shots and situations. This raises the question of whether we embrace it or desperately try to block out the thought of death. If we do the latter, no concentration of our lives can occur. So, alongside respect for scientific development and the principles of transhumanism, which seek not only to prolong life but also to improve its quality, making this film was an opportunity to reflect on myself and whether I am able to live my life to the fullest.”

The film’s application states that its tone resonates with a thought Goethe expressed to Eckermann in 1824: “To occupy oneself with ideas of immortality is the privilege of people who have nothing to do. But a capable man who already thinks here of something worthy and therefore strives, fights, and works every day leaves the future world in peace and is active and useful in this.”

“It’s interesting that in this quote, Goethe preserves the ability to think about his own limitations for those active, successful, and affluent people who are constantly caught up in life. They aren’t consumed by thoughts of extending their existence.”

Director Mārcis Lācis’ vampire film Mūžības skartie (2025) features a character like this, living in a small trailer, growing a belly, and listening to radio broadcasts about immortality.

“Yes, we can easily imagine such a person who receives the gift of immortality, slowly becomes overgrown with moss, and ultimately achieves and experiences less than many who have passed away young.”

How did you select the characters for your film? How did you find them?

“The path to them was complex but also fascinating, as it wasn’t a straightforward process. Some led us to others, and we gradually moved forward, discovering new characters and stories. It involved active communication to talk to each subsequent character, but the film’s realization is proof that nothing is impossible and that we aren’t seen as small people who can’t access valuable resources. We’ve met with the most prominent proponents of transhumanist ideas, many of whom have invested enormous energy in research and are among the most important figures in the field.”

How much pseudoscience is separated from science in this context of longevity and immortality?

“In reality, they aren’t that separate. On one hand, there’s cryonics and the biohacker movement, whose members seek fantastical and everyday solutions to make their lives healthier. On the other hand, there’s artificial intelligence research, robotics development, and medical breakthroughs. But it’s often been science fiction writers and futurists who have inspired scientists to take action.”

To dream.

“To dream and look further. It’s a reciprocal process. For example, proponents of the longevity movement point out that Ozempic or similar drugs, originally created to treat diabetes and later used as a weight-loss aid, could become a medication that extends human life by an average of ten years with further development and the elimination of negative side effects.”

One character in the animated series South Park said: “Rich people get Ozempic, poor people get body positivity.”

Renowned scientist Yuval Noah Harari has also warned that advances in medicine, specifically in the context of longevity, could create an even greater divide between the rich and the poor, who won’t be able to afford it, and thus create additional tension between these groups.

Returning to dreamers – Jules Verne described many future discoveries in his books.

“Yes, you could call it the Jules Verne or Harry Potter effect, where scientific achievements or tools from magical worlds described in books begin to materialize in real life. That’s why I gradually developed respect for these longevity themes and, instead of initially being ironic, began to think that I should be more ironic and critical of myself, rather than others.”

However, the film’s trailer doesn’t lack irony.

“Any film about longevity is a film about death, but we didn’t want to evoke negative emotions in viewers. That’s why the film’s tone is a bit lighthearted. It has comedic and absurd scenes, but that doesn’t preclude asking important questions. The film’s purpose isn’t to confront the viewer; it’s to provide a foundation for reflection on several thematic areas – longevity, scientific development, solvable problems, our own mortality, and perhaps the need to do more, experience more, enjoy more, and generally intensify our lives.”

Delving into the topic, were you surprised by the progress of science in this area? Or perhaps the opposite?

“Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft, has said that people overestimate the changes that can occur in two years, but they never appreciate the changes that can occur in ten years, that people hope for an immediate revolution but don’t see that it’s already happening. I think we are definitely living in a scientifically revolutionary time, where several things are converging – the aforementioned artificial intelligence, robotics, and medicine – but it won’t be that we wake up one day and live much longer. It will gradually enter our daily lives.”

I recently read a phrase that people use artificial intelligence like Google, but could use it much more broadly in their daily lives.

“That’s not even the point, because, paraphrasing one of our film’s characters, you need to wash your hands where it’s intended – meaning that not everyone needs to become a creator or researcher, and everyone can use artificial intelligence according to their understanding and needs, just as science uses it according to its own and its achievements impact our lives or health. Unfortunately, technology also supports the expression of evil, specifically war. The fact that war can still be a reality and isn’t an anachronism, as I would think, and that people are dying is horrifying. As humanity, we should have learned something from history, but all these statements from Russian gerontocrats about the possibility of a nuclear strike against Europe show that they are allowed to determine the fate of the world and that modern technologies have given them a much wider field for their madness.”

There used to be some balance of power, but now it’s scary to watch several European countries sliding towards autocracy and that the same gerontocrats everywhere in the world are unable to accept their short lives and say: I will change everything, even if the flood comes after me! For a moment, I felt this feeling in Latvia as well, when we realized that a good part of the Saeima deputies hadn’t listened and ignored the recommendations of the public, relevant NGOs, business organizations, and foreign partners and made a decision that only promotes violence. It was a sad moment when Latvian lawmakers showed such arrogance.

Where does this arrogance come from?

“This arrogance is quite simple. People were thinking about their future stay in power. It all happened in the context of electoral fishing. They were desperate about not being re-elected to the Saeima next year and decided to position themselves somehow, but the way they did it showed this recklessness. I agree with Alvis Hermanis that unfortunately some lawmakers simply lack intellectual capacity. It may not be correct to compare it to historical examples, but in the interwar Saeima, which also had many political squabbles, the quality of human resources was higher.”

Not everyone wants to go into politics.

“Yes, that’s the problem, but then they have to take responsibility. This is also a reproach to myself – that you can identify problems but don’t want to discredit yourself by going into politics. How else do you turn that moral compass? That’s why I’m grateful for those politicians who take a stand and are able to fight against the darkness, and I believe that we are living in a time when a new generation will enter politics, whose priority won’t be scheming. Their priority won’t be themselves. I’m often accused of speaking badly about old politicians, but in this longevity context, you can say that it’s natural that interest in the public good shifts to interest in personal gain.”

Does an artist, knowing that his works will outlive him, change his attitude towards his own mortality?

“I think that any artist, at the moment he creates something, has a feeling that his works will survive him and that he will continue through them in the future, but that’s more of an unconscious thought. That’s why it’s important for actors to participate in cinema. I think they instinctively feel that their creative life will be extended. I was recently watching Varis Braslas’ film Ziemassvētku jampadracis (1993), which he made with my father as the cinematographer, during the holidays. I myself participated in some episodes. When we watched it now, I stopped the film and showed my son frames of me as a child frolicking and doing other things. At that moment, I thought that several actors have already passed away, but they are so alive there and continue to exist on the screen. You realize that services like ensuring the social media lives of people after their death aren’t without reason, after which they “continue” to make posts on Facebook, Instagram, or elsewhere (based on the analysis of their communication style – I. A.).”

This theme of continuation in art has been encoded since ancient times. It’s anonymous in the Middle Ages, but with the Renaissance and the understanding of the value of life, the author is born. The artist understands: if he writes his name – Michelangelo, Titian, etc. – he will remain.

What about in the case of a teacher?

“It’s different in the case of a teacher, considering that he gives, but he also receives. He shares his knowledge and experience, but in return gains the activity and energy of new people, which is important to prevent himself from aging too quickly. You give professionalism, but you receive freedom and fearlessness in return, because you are constantly trying to put yourself in a framework, but students teach you to break out of it.”