Delete History (2020) — AI Story Visualization

Plot Analysis Summary

A series of personal crises becomes a collective challenge to the digital corporations controlling work, data, and everyday life.

Story Structure — 5 Plot Phases

Subscriptions Enter Daily Life

The film opens with Sylvain's birthday preparations and a household burdened by consumption, phone costs, subscriptions, and digital administration. Separate financial problems show how ordinary life has become dependent on opaque systems.

Key Events

• Sylvain's Birthday Preparations — A family prepares dinner and a birthday game for Sylvain's fifteenth birthday. Characters: Sylvain Location: Family home
• Domestic Consumer Pressure — Complaints about consumption and phone costs expose the pressures behind ordinary domestic life. Characters: Sylvain Location: Family home
• Unwanted Food Subscription — A customer receives a huge bill for an unwanted organic-food subscription. Location: Customer's home
• Failed Loan Searches — A desperate applicant searches for loans while repeatedly forgetting passwords. Location: Online
• Alimony Consultation — A woman seeks legal advice about alimony and explains that she has no income. Location: Legal office

Threats Behind Convenience

Unwanted bills, failed loan searches, forgotten passwords, and a threatening hacker call expose the human cost of digital dependence. The delivery driver's frightening encounter adds a dimension of isolation and employer surveillance.

Key Events

• Threatening Hacker Call — A young hacker threatens the woman after exposing her personal information. Location: Home
• Delivery To Isolation — Le livreur Alimazone brings water to an isolated customer. Characters: Le livreur Alimazone Location: Isolated customer's home
• Driver Panics — The driver panics when the customer suddenly appears to harm himself. Characters: Le livreur Alimazone Location: Isolated customer's home
• Employer Surveillance Fear — He worries that his employer will discover his coffee stop and that his deliveries will be ruined. Characters: Le livreur Alimazone Location: Delivery route

Debt Has A Human Face

Bertrand attempts to survive through online sales, benefit applications, and the sale of household possessions. Christine drives him through a financial crisis that turns private frustration into collective anger.

Key Events

• Bertrand's Debt Maze — Bertrand struggles with debt, false declarations, online sales, and bureaucratic promises. Characters: Bertrand Location: Bertrand's home
• Selling Household Possessions — Bertrand tries to sell possessions to survive his worsening financial situation. Characters: Bertrand Location: Bertrand's home
• Electric Bed Sale — Bertrand sells an electric bed while explaining away its missing part. Characters: Bertrand Location: Bertrand's home
• Christine Drives Bertrand — Christine drives Bertrand as the car approaches a major mileage milestone. Characters: Bertrand, Christine Location: Car
• Economic Frustration Peaks — Their financial desperation turns accumulated frustration into a desire for resistance. Characters: Bertrand, Christine Location: Car

Resistance Against GAFA

Bertrand, Christine, and other dissatisfied people protest against GAFA and demand control over their friends' data. Their refusal transforms scattered complaints into a direct challenge to corporate digital power.

Key Events

• Anti-GAFA Protest — Dissatisfied people protest GAFA and demand the return of their friends' data. Characters: Bertrand, Christine Location: Public protest
• Refusal Of Digital Power — The protesters reject the authority of digital corporations over their lives. Characters: Bertrand, Christine Location: Public protest
• Unexpected Plane Ticket — One protester unexpectedly obtains a plane ticket and leaves for Dublin. Location: Airport

Toward A Human Alternative

Travelers move toward Dublin, Mauritius, and Palo Alto while maintaining contact with the resistance. A proposal to unite with exploited workers reframes individual failure as the beginning of a collective alternative.

Key Events

• Journey Toward Google — Another traveler goes through Mauritius and heads toward Google's Palo Alto data center. Location: Mauritius and Palo Alto
• Plane Contact With Bertrand — From the plane, the traveler contacts Bertrand and proposes joining forces with exploited workers. Characters: Bertrand, Christine Location: Airplane and phone contact
• A Human Alternative — Private failures become a collective attempt to create a more human alternative. Characters: Bertrand, Christine Location: Collective resistance network

Story Breakdown

• Birthday And Consumption — The opening family setting introduces ordinary life shaped by food, purchases, subscriptions, and phone costs.
  • Sylvain's Birthday — A family prepares dinner, homemade beer, bread, spreads, groceries, and a birthday game for Sylvain.
  • Cost Of Convenience — Complaints about excessive consumption and expensive phone services reveal the pressures beneath domestic normality.
• Digital Financial Traps — Several people encounter bills, applications, passwords, and services that intensify their financial insecurity.
  • Unwanted Subscription — A customer receives a huge bill for an organic-food subscription that was not wanted.
  • Failed Loan Applications — Another person searches for loans but repeatedly fails to remember the required passwords.
• Privacy And Isolation — Digital exposure and algorithmic work systems create fear, vulnerability, and isolation.
  • Threatening Hacker — A woman receives a threatening call after a young hacker exposes her information.
  • Driver Under Watch — Le livreur Alimazone panics over an emergency and fears employer discovery and damaged delivery performance.
• Bertrand's Survival Maze — Bertrand responds to debt and bureaucracy through increasingly desperate attempts to sell possessions and manipulate applications.
  • Selling Household Goods — Bertrand sells possessions and an electric bed while explaining the absence of a missing part.
  • Mileage And Desperation — Christine drives Bertrand in a heavily used car as their worsening financial situation becomes undeniable.
• Collective Digital Revolt — Private frustrations merge into a protest movement that openly rejects GAFA's control over personal data.
  • Anti-GAFA Protest — Bertrand, Christine, and other dissatisfied people demand the return of their friends' data.
  • Rejecting Corporate Power — The protesters refuse to accept the authority of digital corporations over their lives.
• Toward Human Solidarity — Travel and communication expand the protest from a local grievance into a possible international alliance.
  • Journeys To Data Centers — One traveler leaves for Dublin while another travels through Mauritius toward Google's Palo Alto data center.
  • A New Collective — A traveler contacts Bertrand and proposes joining forces with exploited workers to create a more human alternative.

Directed by

Benoît Delépine, Gustave Kervern

Key Cast

• Blanche Gardin — Marie
• Denis Podalydès — Bertrand
• Corinne Masiero — Christine
• Vincent Lacoste — Le Sextapeur
• Benoît Poelvoorde — Le livreur Alimazone