A Triptych AORTA – Mortality – Trust – Humility [V2]

Logline
A real-life-experience painfully remembered to create a visceral 12-minute film-noir triptych where original poetry and iterative AI direction reconstruct the psychological landscape of a near-fatal medical emergency, charting a journey from physical rupture to spiritual surrender. This is VERSION 2 of the work with ‘TRUST” audiovisual AI props substantially reworked. I have diagnosed C-PTSD, this is not an inhibitor but more of an enlightening factor.The poetic works are published in “lines that Linger’, ISBN-13 979-8275243222

Synopsis
In December 2022, a life-altering medical event fractured a long-standing career in investment banking and replaced it with the immediate, breathless reality of a struggling aorta. Born from poetry written in July 2025, this 12-minute experimental work uses a three-panel triptych structure to navigate the stages of post-traumatic recovery.
The work moves through three distinct phases: Mortality (the rupture of permanence), Trust (the clinical confrontation of the machine), and Humility (the eventual surrender to form). Staged within a stark, shadow-driven digital noir, the film avoids the “glossy” clichés of modern AI in favor of a “Technical Mono” aesthetic—where pulse becomes rhythm and breath becomes structure. This is not a documentation of a crisis, but its internal reconstruction.

Director’s Statement
The events of 17th December 2022 fundamentally reordered my world, shifting my focus from the quantitative logic of investment banking to the fluid, often irrational landscapes of C-PTSD and physical survival. My transition to filmmaking at age 60 was not driven by an interest in technology, but by a necessity to externalize an “Internal Reconstruction” that words alone could not contain.
This triptych is a product of “Iterative Authorship.” While I utilize generative AI tools, the technology functions as an instrument, not an origin. Each minute of visual output is the result of 15 to 30 hours of manual direction, blocking, and camera control to ensure the machine respects the “human soul” . I chose a film-noir aesthetic to utilize “shadow as revelation,” allowing the stark contrast to mirror the vulnerability of the aorta cross-clamped. By framing this experience through a triptych, I aim to “unframe” the stereotypical portrayal of disability, presenting instead a rich, diverse, and technically rigorous reality of survival.

I wrote the poetry and converted the poems to lyrics. I then used AI tooling to iteratively direct to provide audio/visual landscapes o provide an immersive experience – the way I feel when I am watching opera in the Arena in Verona.

I will write a sequel, as a triptych “The Aftemath” – I am not ready to do this just yet!!

As a result of my medical emergency in December 2022, I have some disabilities which have driven me to push my artistic and creative boundaries. My diagnosed C-PTSD i do not view this as an inhibitor but an enlightening factor.

Directed by Adam J K N Mitchell (UK)