Audiences may not be ready take an active role in the creative process, but makers of interactive cinema aren’t waiting around until they are. By combining the interactivity of a video game with the depth of the film environment, these moviemaking pioneers are doing nothing short of redefining the passive role of the traditional theater audience. For some moviemakers this technology—which they believe will put everyone in the director’s chair—is as exciting as any on the immediate horizon.

The cinema began as a silent medium. A player piano in the theater was the only sound to accompany a series of sometimes random black and white issues/44/images. An appreciation for the gesture that the film—or an actor—could make was essential to the understanding of the silent world created on the screen.

A language was passed to the audience without any prior conscious communication as to what the symbols meant. Stories were created with gesture alone.

Interactive cinema attempts to mimic the sense of meditation in the film medium by creating a repeating environment where the gestures of the actors and the film itself can be interpreted and acted upon by the audience. Viewers are able to replay the sequences and understand the action as more than simply spectators—and that interaction creates a deeper understanding of the guiding principles of the film.

It allows the viewer a sense of involvement with the medium that creates a living language, while at the same time offering the space to study what’s being created.

Moving issues/44/images become signposts of understanding, prompting the audience to take part in the creation of a unique form of communication. Not unlike the traditional role of cinema, interactive film has the all-inclusive ability to demonstrate itself without the need for reference material; all that is required is the viewer’s willingness to pay attention.

The non-linear navigation system that is used by interactive cinema has a history of portrayal in the traditional cinema. Movies such as Buffalo 66, Run Lola Run and Requiem for a Dream follow a rich recent history of examples that include Pulp Fiction, Slacker and Repo Man—each of which manipulates a spatial narrative to create a non-linear montage. Film historians can also look back to classics such as Citizen Kane for further examples of films with elements of non-linearity. The makers of these films are really only linear mimics attempting to portray something that they could never achieve. But with digital media, moviemakers will be able to realize new potentials; there is no question that the possibilities offered by this highly interactive medium will change the way society views the moviegoing experience.

As the world’s communication network grows, it becomes nearly impossible for a single artist to create a vision inclusive enough to speak to all of his or her community. James Joyce carried this dilemma to one of its furthest outposts with the creation of Finnegan’s Wake, a tale carrying so many themes and storylines, it created a jumble of reality so thick, few could make it through its tangled web. But in the weaving of this web Joyce created one of the greatest visions the literary world has offered. It was a vision that could be likened to a trip through the World Wide Web—a virtual collapse of information in on itself, offering an infinite diversity of possible combinations. The viewer loses his or her wits quickly in the insanity of this mess, which is why very few browse the Web without purpose; it would be like hiking in the rainforest without a compass. But many readers are up for the challenge offered by works like that of Joyce. The reward for tackling this challenge is release from the world’s everyday relationships and a chance to reformat their understanding of language.

Interactive Cinema in Action Uncompressed is a workout for the imagination by Margi Szperling Uncompressed is a film that allows the audience to take an interactive role in the entertainment process. It simulates the environment of shared control with viewers by allowing them the opportunity to view the material in any order they decide. The individual can choose the traditional linear format and watch the sequences in the default order, or the narrative arc can be subverted by interacting with the issues/44/images. Navigation of the piece is built into visual cues which are unique to each sequence.Each character’s storyline is color-coded to represent his individual theme. The navigational controls are image based rather than menu based, blending the action of the film with that of the audience. The entire interface is contained within the content itself, which eliminates the need for additional levels of navigation. The story contains elements that contribute to the interactivity of the material; the characters represent ideals as much as they’re there to simply tell a story. I believe that interactive cinema requires that the script be written specifically with the end product firmly understood. The script for Uncompressed constantly needed to be updated to meet the needs of the interface as well as the narrative flow of the work as a whole. Following one storyline, the viewer becomes aware of the interconnectedness of all of the stories. However, it is only through repeated viewings that the intentions of the various themes become apparent. My hope was to create a series of subtle questions meant to discredit and validate themselves within the storyline of Uncompressed. I realize this is a conundrum—all provocative artwork contains opposites. Every storyline shows how different the same reality can appear; it shows perspectives as they intersect with each other. This is where the strength of the piece lies. With this vast an amount of interactive content, much is learned by traveling between the layers. By allowing the material to validate itself, or deny its own existence, the piece seems to come alive with intention. The amount of content creates a unique space in which the characters are filled with life. Uncompressed is a workout for the imagination. The process of creating Uncompressed took me down many different paths filled with contradiction. Producing the many aspects offered insights from the various disciplines involved—from plotting to storyboarding to filming and then to editing and putting on the final touches, the content remained in a constant state of flux. The influences of many minds pushed the piece in directions that I could never have imagined when I started this journey. The tailoring of the narrative arc of each storyline to highlight the eccentricities of specific characters is evident in the details; from the art direction to the soundtrack to the visual treatment of each sequence, the details serve to highlight the characters as unique individuals. To study the realities of these diverse characters is to understand that each is as valid as the others. The inconsistencies are essential to make the audience question their own prejudices. Every viewing of Uncompressed reveals different aspects of the same story, both through the sequence of events and viewer’s individual perspective. To find out more about Uncompressed, please visit our website at www.substanz.net/uncompressed.

Another example of a writer attempting to exceed the limits of the written language is novelist William Gibson. In Gibson’s novel, Neuromancer, we are taken into a future landscape created in a multidimensional digital realm. The virtual possibilities push language to an exploration of the many dimensions of digital reality. William S. Burroughs is a prime example of a writer exploring the narrative possibilities offered within the non-linear aesthetic; Naked Lunch is just one example offered by this innovative yet disturbing author. Georges Perec has tried to overcome the traditional literary mold by focusing on the time element and allowing a location to be the focus of many stories in his novel Life: A User’s Manual. Still, it is the linear nature of reading that pulls us back to the single dimension of time and the written word. We are forced by the format of the written medium to see events in a chain—and to sacrifice our own curious nature for the flow of the story. Interactive cinema allows viewers the choice to follow their own whims without the traditional structure of the audience following the medium.

By combining the interactivity of a video game with the depth of the film environment, interactive moviemakers are redefining the traditionally passive role of the theater audience, as with Margi Szperling’s Uncompressed.

Interactive cinema looks to contain the volume of information that is allowed by the written word, as well as the ability to review that material, in an attempt to help the viewer relate to the complete experience of communicating with the medium. Literature captures vast amounts of information, but the presenting medium cannot be reviewed with the ease that the digital format allows.

Interactive media allows vast amounts of information to speak at a rate that can be easily reviewed and evaluated, creating an environment that is completely natural to the understanding of the viewer. In turn, it allows the viewer to comfortably access the system on her own terms—to personalize the material for a more realized experience. To better utilize this freedom, an understanding of the audience’s interactions within the digital medium will need to occur. Or, as Bertold Brecht stated not so very long ago, “cinema needs new tools.”

To add to Brecht’s apt comment, the public needs to come to a new understanding of what is possible with these tools. Interactive cinema will help the audience to learn the capabilities of non-linear language. The new form of interaction between viewer and media is direct; the involvement concerns learning how to relate to issues/44/images in a familiar but unique format. With this new understanding will come a rebirth of the appreciation of the gesture.

Interactive cinema simulates the environment of shared control with the viewer by allowing viewers to view material in the order that they choose. It challenges the audience to come to terms with the information they are receiving while, at the same time, it teaches a much more efficient method of understanding, based on patterns and intuition. By creating a unique environment in each scene, then repeating the visual cues as prompts to the audience, the viewer becomes accustomed to the reality with which they are being presented. The result is that they take an interactive role in the entertainment process.

The ever more complex options offered by modern media are allowing this new understanding to take the viewers’ minds to realms of possibility that would not have been attainable with any other medium. Over the last three years, the digital gaming industry has grossed more revenue than the movie industry—and the combination of these industries is inevitable.

It won’t be long before audiences become dissatisfied with simply having a passive role in the world of film. Interactive cinema is the future of modern entertainment; to connect with it or not— that choice is yours. MM