William Gibson recounts his life and the meaning of his work in contemplative fashion throughout this film and the insight gained is well worth whatever work one may need to do in order to seek this out....On an overcast morning in April 1999, William Gibson, the man who coined the word ‘cyberspace’, walked out of LAX Terminal 2 and steps into a limousine in LA and sets off on a road trip around North America, from West to East and South to North, from Los Angeles to New York, from Virginia to Vancouver.
The limo is rigged with digital cameras, a computer, a TV, a stereo and a cell phone. The entire movie was generated by this wheeled media machine. Most of the time Gibson had no other company other than his driver, with whom he talked at length, and with great candor and humor, about his life. The conversation provides a compelling glimpse at the radical, genius writer whose 1984 novel ‘Neuromancer’ forever changed the concept of the Internet, propelling the author to the forefront of the media explosion of the late nineties.
‘No Maps’ is both an acount of Gibson’s life and work and a commentary on the world outside the car windows, the landscape of Western culture on the edge of the new millenium, in the throes of convulsive, tech-driven change, which grows to resemble Gibson’s fiction more each passing year, each mile. In order to reflect on this interview with Gibson, director Mark Neale added more layers to this documentary: a soundtrack by Tomandandy, readings of Gibson’s fiction an interview with writer and fellow cyberpunk pioneer Bruce Sterling and digital composites of the changing imagery through the limo's windows.