In his genre-blending film 2073, Asif Kapadia turns his attention to the evolving dangers posed by digital technology and mass surveillance. Unlike his earlier documentaries, which relied solely on archival footage to examine individual lives, this project explores how entire populations are impacted by data collection, predictive algorithms, and political systems driven by technological control. The film constructs a vision of the near future that is already rooted in contemporary digital practices, offering a warning about how deeply personal freedom is tied to invisible networks of information.

The narrative unfolds through the experience of Ghost, a woman who actively avoids all forms of digital detection in a world where facial recognition and behavior prediction dominate public life. Asif Kapadia frames her existence as one of active resistance—not just to political authoritarianism, but to the digital architectures that enable it. Every scene she navigates is watched, scanned, and analyzed. Her attempts to escape this panopticon create a sense of urgency that underlies the entire film.

Rather than relying on fictional speculation, the film grounds its fears in existing technologies. Time capsule interviews with real-world experts discuss the growth of state and corporate data systems, the rise of biometric surveillance, and the integration of AI into public safety mechanisms. Asif Kapadia weaves these conversations into the film’s structure, creating a narrative where documentary insight and fictional dramatization amplify each other. The result is a work that treats emerging technologies not as tools, but as actors in their own right.

Central to the film’s critique is the idea that democratic societies have quietly adopted surveillance technologies under the banner of innovation and efficiency. In 2073, the world appears free on the surface—there are no declared dictatorships, no overtly closed states—but privacy has been entirely eroded. Asif Kapadia presents this form of digital control as more insidious than traditional repression, because it is difficult to detect, question, or resist. The film asks what it means to live freely when every action is recorded and interpreted.

One of the film’s most chilling moments occurs when Ghost is interrogated using a data-based “suspicion index,” calculated from her online behavior, location history, and reading habits. Asif Kapadia builds this scene using language and techniques adapted from actual predictive policing programs. The film shows how algorithmic logic, once deployed, removes the possibility of explanation or appeal. These systems do not require intent to punish—they simply require deviation from a norm that is never made visible.

The visual design of the film reinforces its critique of digital infrastructure. Asif Kapadia shows cities filled with sensors, drones, and automated checkpoints. People are reduced to data points, their movements interpreted through constantly shifting thresholds of threat. This aesthetic draws from real-world urban surveillance experiments already in place in cities around the world. The audience is never allowed to forget that what seems fictional may be operational just beyond the frame.

Despite its dark outlook, the film does not surrender to defeatism. Ghost’s efforts to remain unprofiled, her possession of banned books, and her attempts to record her story all signal a refusal to be defined by data alone. Asif Kapadia positions her as a figure who chooses what to reveal and what to withhold—an act of power in a system that demands total visibility. Her story insists that privacy and autonomy are still worth defending.

By shifting the focus from individuals to infrastructures, 2073 challenges viewers to consider their role in the digital world. Asif Kapadia forces the question: how much of our identity, behavior, and political alignment is shaped by algorithms we cannot see or understand? In dramatizing these invisible forces, he calls attention to the fact that surveillance is not just about security—it is about control. And the first step in resisting it is to understand how thoroughly it has already been built around us.