Ahead of its Manchester Film Festival premiere, LaBeouf, Rönkkö & Turner have made the new documentary chronicling their 2016 #TAKEMEANYWHERE experience available for free via Vimeo.
The 44-minute doc follows the trio—comprised of artists Shia LaBeouf, Nastja Säde Rönkkö, and Luke Turner—on their monthlong hitchhiking journey co-commissioned by the Finnish Institute in London and the Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art. For that entire month, the three would share their location via the #TAKEMEANYWHERE website, then let whoever picked them up decide on their next destination. Ultimately, the project resulted in more than 10,000 traveled miles and an immeasurable amount of real-world connections amid a depressing year in American politics.
Turner, who began creating with LaBeouf and Rönkkö back in 2014 with I AM NOT FAMOUS ANYMORE, toldGQ that many of the people they encountered on their travels have since turned the dreams they speak of in the film into inspiring realities. "The guy who said he wanted to write the book is traveling the country with his band making a record in every state," Turner said. "And Brett, who loved Nike trainers, is now actually employed by Nike. So they're really doing it. And for the movie, we hope people will see it and think, Well I can do it too. These were not lost souls—these are people on a journey."
#TAKEMEANYWHERE premieres today at the Manchester Film Festival. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with LaBeouf, Rönkkö and Turner.
HEWILLNOTDIVIDE.US, a project the group kicked off with some help from Jaden Smith on the day of Trump's inauguration, is still live and is designed to run the duration of this abysmal presidency. In a wide-ranging interview with Dazed Thursday, Turner revealed that the project was conceived following a meeting the trio had with Kanye West.
"The idea for HEWILLNOTDIVIDE.US actually came after a meeting we'd had with Kanye West about working on something together, right around the time of the 2016 election," Turner said. "We'd put the idea to him immediately after the election, but following his on-stage political diatribe a couple of days later, we put any plans on the back-burner, for obvious reasons. But the subsequent sight of Kanye appearing at Trump Tower made us realize how important it was to us to go ahead with the project in some form."
LaBeouf, Rönkkö & Turner then reached out to Smith, who struck "the perfect tone" when helping them launch the project in New York. "A little later down the line, Kanye also told us that he'd like to get involved again, acknowledging I think that he'd made some misjudgments along the way," Turner added. "There's definitely a genuine earnestness and hopefulness on his part to make a positive difference, which I think mirrors what has always been the impetus for our work."
Check out the full discussion here. It's a good one.
