COMMUNITY GUIDELINES

by Maren Dagny Juell

2026

15:55 min 4K

This film is currently installed in Oslo, at Kulturetatens Kunstcontainer by Sukkerbiten. You can also watch it here as long as it is up and running.

Credits:

Produced, written, directed and edited by Maren Dagny Juell

Actors:

Solheim: Sondre Krogtoft Larsen

Eidol: Samatha Lawson

Crew:

Director of Photography: Jørgen Wetaas Bull

B Photo: Aleksander Andreassen

Costume Design: Maïna Joner

Sound Technician: Hanne Treidene

Production Assistant: Hannah Kvamsdal

Postproduction, Graphics and sound: Maren Dagny Juell

Consulting Producer: Tonje Alice Madsen

Recorded at Vjus Studio, Oslo

Thanks to the generous advice and input from:

Fredrik Skavlan

Richard Cawte

Katharina Martina Østergaard

Sisse Lee

Funded by:

The Audio and Visual Fund, Arts Council Norway, Norwegian Visual Artists Fund

Community Guidelines is a 15-minute short film set in a near future where images are heavily censored and visual information is no longer considered trustworthy. In this society, a talk show serves as entertainment for a privileged population, and the film follows an interview between the host and the evening’s guest, a former content cleaner who once censored violent and traumatic imagery.

The guest describes the psychological consequences of her work and a strange phenomenon: abstract objects she dreams about begin to materialize in reality, affecting people emotionally despite being seemingly meaningless fragments. Throughout the interview, a growing sense of unease emerges—connected both to the guest’s concealed identity and the talk show’s surface-level lightness. The film invites doubt about whether the guest is even human at all, questioning empathy in a time when AI is increasingly taking over the task of filtering the world’s suffering.

The talk-show format acts as a familiar entry point into a dystopian scenario where spectacle overshadows humanity. Blending humor, vulnerability, and sci-fi elements, the film explores how technology shapes empathy, autonomy, and our ability to confront the pain of others.

The few images we can see, we can guarantee