On Thursday night, the Block Museum of Art featured the documentary “Resurrect Dead: The Mystery of the Toynbee Tiles”. The one and a half hour film unveiled the ongoing mystery of the Toynbee tiles, which were notably embedded with the words “Toynbee Idea/In Kubrick’s 2001/Resurrect Dead/On Planet Jupiter”.
Justin Duerr, the main investigator of this phenomenon and subject of the documentary, found these tiles all over the eastern U.S. and in Latin America. He promised he would find the ‘master tiler’ behind the mysterious artwork, a goal he finally accomplished at the end of the documentary.
Communication freshman Bobby Ramirez said the film engaged him because it documented the actions of conspiracy theorists.
“The film almost got me thinking about a fictional sort of piece with the same sort of concept,” Ramirez said. “The idea of not being able to get your voice out in mainstream media, so you do whatever you can to get your idea out elsewhere.”
He said he would recommend the documentary to a friend.
Evanston resident Paula Ketcham, who had no prior knowledge of the Toynbee tiles, said she found the documentary fascinating.
“I thought they told Justin in the story really well,” Ketcham said.
Local resident Kate Wrobel was not as impressed. She said she came to the showing after a preview piqued her interest.
Wrobel said the documentary was just okay for although she did refer to it as “poignant”.
“Some of the overuse of the type and the bad quality of it was annoying,” Wrobel said. “That would probably be why I’m like ‘eh’ a little bit. Not enough variety of visuals. But the story was interesting.”
