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According to Lethem, several film directors, e.g. Orson Welles, Chris Marker, Michael Almereyda, show neotonous traits in their “essay films”. The neotenous aesthetics revolves around the idea of leaving some “Unresolved elements or problems inside the works,” that is, to showcase the nature of the problem without necessarily propose any solution. So why is this phenomenon important? According to Lethem, neoteny is particularly evident in our age, an age “We call postmodernity, apocalypse, globalization, hyper-connectivity, hyper-velocity”. The common denominator of all these definitions is that they identify a problem, a problem requiring “An unprecedented level of playfulness”. Thus, to survive today one must adopt a neotonous attitude: embrace hesitation and indecisiveness. “The Arts as a whole can be seen in a neotonous relationship to our world”. According to Lethem, like play “Art is largely not utilitarian, and uncommodifiable activity, deeply typical of children”. Thus, “All arts are a form of play”. Huizinga would certainly agree. Lethem has been discussing neoteny for several years now (consider, for example, this conversation with Rodrigo Fresan in 2006), but this articulation was particularly engaging. Lethem ideas about the playfulness of art reminds me of Vilem Flusser’s notion of the Non-Spectacular playful revolutionaries he described in his masterful Into the Universe of Technical Images.”
