Detour Off the Superhighway (2013)

From smartphones to the dark ages of pinhole cameras, quills and beyond, watch filmmaker Patrick Kelly - a self-confessed techno junkie - give up modern gadgets to see if life would be easier with the old stuff. It's hard to imagine what our lives would be like without technology, but that's exactly what Patrick does when he switches off for 80 days, going cold turkey by using 8 different older devices to understand how important the new ones are to us. This very personal and funny, feature-length documentary takes a fly-on-the-wall approach to follow one Melbourne man as he - along with the help of his friends and housemates - uses just about every camera and communication process ever invented to see just how reliant we are on the modern way of making images and interacting with one another. Everyone thinks of the old days as being simpler times. This tale of old and new takes the audience back in time to see how we used to connect and create; ultimately questioning how reliant we are on the latest technology.