VIDFEST 2008 Screening: Late Fragment
Jeff Parazzo, actor Théo in Late Fragment
On the final day of VIDFEST, I attended a screening of Late Fragment. This interactive film had been shown at SXSW 2008 as well it was part of the Future of Cinema Salon Series at the Cannes Film Festival 2008. Ana Serrano, Director of the Habitat new media lab at the Canadian Film Centre introduced the film and was kind enough to provide me with a press package due to my media credentials.
Ana Serrano, Director of the Habitat new media lab @ Canadian Film Centre
From the press package:
Late Fragment is an interactive film that lets audiences piece together, both literally and figuratively, the cinematic narrative in front of them. The physical experience is not unline channle surfing in front of the television, except imagine that each channel presents different scences from the same story. Late Fragment is the kind of film audiences will need to “play” over and over again, as they tease out the relationships between characters, between past and present, between right and wrong, and between old stories and the creation of new ones.
Faye, Kevin, and Théo - three troubled strangers, three lives fractured by thoughts and acts of violence. In the interacitve feature film Late Fragment, their narratives interlock in a unique cinematic experience in which you play a creative and interactive role. Navigating through the movie, you uncover their stories, and their secrets, at will, controllling the flow and direction of the elaborate sequencing with a simple click.
From the Fact Sheet
- co-production of two national organizations, the Canadian Film Centre (CFC) and the National Film Board of Canada (NFB), and is the first dramatic interactive feature film to come out in North America.
- inspired by Switching, an interactive film directed by Morten Schjodt of Oncotype and produced by the Danish Film Institute.
- an interactive film is an active vs. a passive viewing experience where audiences piece together, both literally and figuratively, the cinematic narrative in front of them. Late Fragment delivered via DVD-video lets audiences click “enter” on their remote control, and impact the way the story unfolds, sequencing the events of the story depending on when and how often they click “enter”
Before the film was shown, audience members that were interested in an active viewing experience sat in the front row so that the remote control could be shared between them. Ana Serrano first began the process by clicking the remote control. During the Q&A, she stated that she did that to get the process started as audiences tend to initially watch without clicking. As the story centres around a theme of restorative justice with perpetrators and victims being brought together in a room, if the remote control hasn’t been clicked by that time of that initial scene then the film enters a loop focusing on each of the faces of the 3 main characters until engaged.
I enjoyed the film although some of the more graphic scenes caused me to look down and focus on my Blackberry until they were passed. As someone watching an interactive film but without the power to control the interactivity as I sat in the back, throughout the film I wished I had that power. I would have used it to change the scenes that I found to be too intense for me. I didn’t have a problem following the three separate storylines of Faye, Kevin, and Théo. However in our sitting, the interactive process resulted in Kevin and Théo being shown the majority of the film and Faye only was shown a little bit. If we watched the film again though, the interactive process would be different, perhaps resulting in more Faye and Kevin, but less Théo.
The film reminded me of the interactive books I read as a child. I would follow the main character and be able to turn to one page if I want the character to do one thing and another page if I wanted the character to do something else. I don’t remember what the formal term was for these types of books.
During the Q&A, it was brought up that three writers-directors each was responsible for a story and had to develop scenes that could stand on their own as it would not be known what scene the audience was looking at previously. As noted on the Fest21.com blog: Daryl Cloran, wrote Kevin’s story; Anita Doron was responsible for Faye’s Story, and Mateo Guez developed Théo’s Story
This was a fascinating film even without its interactive feature and I look forward to seeing whether we have more interactive films in the future.
Below is my video interview of Ana Serrano about Late Fragment (click arrow).
Ana Serrano, Director of the Habitat new media lab @ CFC
Relevance: A novel approach to engaging one’s audience.
