Optimum, les pionniers du meilleur des mondes

Optimum is a wry look at three eccentric 19th century intellectuals, and how they laid the groundwork for concepts we now take for granted: increased efficiency, exhaustive classification, statistical analysis, and biological determinism. Jeremy Bentham, a jurist, Charles Babbage, an inventor, and Francis Galton, a statistician, invested their energies into a “zero error” concept applicable to all of society. Optimum retraces their lives, materializes their most audacious projects, notably by reconstituting via animation their wild inventions. In doing so, the film demonstrates that the dream of completely controlling human life can ironically turn into the darkest of fantasies.