You Can't Kill Meme

World Premiere Fantasia Film Festival 2021. A feature length anti-documentary film about the genesis of memetic magick and its application by the alt-right in the United States. The filmmaker chronicles the online rise of the belief that users on internet forums were harnessing chaos magick in order to elect Donald Trump in 2016. The film follows a three year journey into and out of this world: starting in Los Angeles, where the director meets YouTube magicians and new right podcasters, following the rabbit hole to Nevada. Uprooting her life, she relocates to Las Vegas immediately after the mass shooting. It is there that she finds herself falling into a world of spirituality and conspiracy populated by shamans, prophets, and "lightworkers" in every sector-from New Age entrepreneurs to military personnel working in cybersecurity. Finally, she traces the origins of memetic magick to Kirk Packwood in Washington state, the author of the book that inspired legions of warlocks online. This firsthand account, like the grotesque lovechild of Agnes Varda and Adam Curtis, follows the director's confrontation of the deplorables, the edgelords, the new right, and the magicians. You Can't Kill Meme explores our polarized world through a novel lens that leaves the viewer questioning reality and illusion in the wake of another election.